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Pioneer* of <£l ©orabo 

By 
CHARLES &MER UPTON 



Author of "The Life and Work of the Rev. 
C. C. Peirce," etc. 



31- babe no taorbs to tfpeafc ttjetr prater. 

Cfjtirtf tea* tiie fceeb; ttjr gutrbon our*. 
<Cfre toilberncga anb toearp bap* 

Wtxt tfttirtf alone; (or u* tbe f lotoertf. 

[A. J. Waterhou»e] 



J?lacer?Ule, California 

Charles Ilmei Upton, P«bli*her 

1906. 






U8RARY of CONGRESS 
Two Cooies Received 
WAY 27 I90f 
f] Copyright Entry 

GLASS A XXc, No 

r ma ir 

COPY B 



Copyright, 1906 
By Charles Elmer Upton. 

All rights reserved. 



The Nugget Press 
Placerville, California 



A FOREWORD. 

It has not been my intention to sketch the 
lives of all of El Dorado county's pioneers; but 
rather to give, in the form of a few representa- 
tive biographies, those events in our county's 
annals which are most worthy of being pre- 
served as history, together with such anecdotes, 
both comic and pathetic, which would best serve 
to indicate what manner of people the early Cal- 
ifornians were. Necessarily, in a book of this 
description, much has been written that may 
shock the over-fastidious. But history is a 
chronicle of vital events, and as such must de- 
pict both the evil and the good. It must be re- 
membered that the early settlers of California 
were a most conglomerate mass of humanity, 
representing every grade of refinement and of 
vulgarity; and the true narrative of such a peo- 
ple, or, in fact, of any real life, cannot be ex- 
pected to resemble an Elsie Dinsmore Sunday- 
school story. 



For aid in the compilation of this book, I am 
indebted, first of all, to many of the living pio- 
neers, and to the relatives and friends of other 
pioneers whose earthly careers are at an end. I 
have likewise obtained much valuable assistance 
from the files of the Placerville and Georgetown 
newspapers, and from the pages of Raskins' 
"Argonauts of California/' Parsons' "Life of J. 
W. Marshall," Sioli's "History of El Dorado 
County/' Hall's "Around the Horn in '49," 
Leeper's "Argonauts of Forty-Nine," Ridge's 
"Life of Joaquin Murieta" and Theodore H. Hit- 
tell's scholarly "History of California." 

I fully realize the many deficiencies of this 
little book; but if I have succeeded in compiling 
an interesting history of the old "Empire 
County," suited in price to the purse of the aver- 
age reader, and at the same time have added 
something, however small, to the annals of Cali- 
fornia, I am content. 

Charles Elmer Upton, 

Placerville, Cal., September 30, 1906. 



To my dear friends 

and former pupils, 

Mabel, Stella, Ralph and Edgar Berry, 

grandchildren of one of the worthiest of El 

Dorado county's pioneers, 

this book is dedicated. 



CONTENTS. 

Page 
I. 
James W. Marshall, the Founder of a Com- 
monwealth 3 

II. 
Mathias Lauber, With General Kearney in 

'46 36 

III. 
Samuel Kyburz, Who Led a Sutter Expe- 
dition 52 

IV. 
William B. House, Around the Horn in '49 64 

V. 
Alexander Connell of the Famous Mamaluke 

Hill 80 

VI. 
Reuben K. Berry, First Alcalde of Salmon 

Falls 89 

VII. 
Robert C. Fugate, the Miner of a Half-Cen- 
tury 100 

VIII. 
George W. Henry, Merchant, Scout and 

Miner 108 

IX. 
Gelwicks and January, the Pioneer Editors 121 

X. 

George C. Ranney, Special Deputy-Sheriff 

at Bullion Bend 128 

XI. 

James B. Hume, the Noted Wells-Fargo De- 
tective 142 

XII. 

James W. Summerfield, of the "Gold Lake'' 
Party 150 



XIII. 
G. J. Carpenter, Pioneer Lawyer and Editor 160 

Conclusion 178 

APPENDIX. 

Joaquin Murieta, the Bandit 181 

Gold Production of El Dorado county 201 



INDEX OF IMPORTANT EVENTS. 

Page 

Bear Flag War 38 

"Bill Rogers' Indian War" 43 

Bullion Bend Robbery 130 

Convict Hunt, The 168 

Crane and Mickey Free, Cases of 110 

Devine, Lynching of 82 

Discovery of Gold at Coloma 9 

Fires in Placerville 125 

"Gold Lake" Affair 151 

"Hangtown," Name of 54 

"Irish Dick," Lynching of 75 

Logan and Lipsey, Cases of. 102 

Lynchings at Coloma 76 

Marshall's Death 34 

Myers, Olsen and Drager, Case of 164 

"Ohio Diggings" 26 

San Francisco Earthquake and Fire 179 

Tornado, El Dorado's • 167 

"White Rock Jack" 145 

ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Page 
Frontispiece, Sutter's Mill, Coloma. 

Marshall Monument 34 ' 

Placerville— Hangtown— in 1850 75 

Salmon Falls 98 / 

Main Street, Placerville, in 1906 140 / 

JFallen Leaf Lake... 160 



Pioneers of El Dorado, 



JAMES W. MARSHALL, 



THE FOUNDER OF A COMMONWEALTH. 

It was during the sixteenth century that 
a Caucasian first set foot upon the Pacific slops 
of North America, but to the loyal Californian an 
ever-memorable day in January, 1848, represents 
the virtual beginning of the land of his nativity. 
A little mill-race at Coloma, on the South Fork of 
the American riv^r, in El Dorado county, is of 
greater moment to him than are the privations 
and achievements of the Franciscan Fathers, the 
voyages of Commodores Sloat and Stockton, or 
the invaluable services of Captain John C. Fre- 
mont. 

Upon a hill overlooking historic Coloma, there 
stands to-day a granite monument surmounted by 



4 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

a life-sized figure of James W. Marshall, in 
miner's garb, one hand clasping a bronzed repro- 
duction of a nugget of gold, and the other ex- 
tended with its index finger pointing towards the 
site of famous Sutter's Mill, all traces of which 
have been as completely obliterated as if it had 
never existed. 

James Wilson Marshall was a native of Hope 
Township, Hunterdon county, New Jersey, 
where his advent occurred October 10, 1810. In 
boyhood he was apprenticed to his father's trade, 
that of a coach and wagon builder. His early 
years were uneventful; but after attaining his 
majority a desire to see something of the west 
took possession of him. Accordingly he select- 
ed a few necessary articles from his small be- 
longings, and adding thereto the usual outfit of 
the average pioneer, soon left the scenes of his 
childhood and youth far behind him. 

Reaching Crawfordsville, Indiana, he halted 
and supported himself for a time by carpenter 
work. But after a few months he again set 
forth, going to Warsaw, Illinois. His sojourn 
here was likewise brief, and we next find him 
in the * Platte Purchase" near Fort Leavenworth, 
Missouri. Here he located a homestead and de- 
voted his energies to farming and trading; but 
just as Fortune was beginning to smile upon him 
he contracted "fever and ague." After combat- 
ting for six years the insidious ravages of ma- 
laria, he resolved again to emigrate, as his physi- 
cian assured him that two years more of that 
climate meant death. 

At that period there was a great deal said about 
a wonderful country in the far west called Cali- 
fornia. It was said to be a region of vast fertility; 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 5 

there were many rivers; and timber and game 
abounded. 

Marshall's plans were soon formulated. He 
would go to California. Other men of his 
neighborhood were organizing for the same pur- 
pose; so, collecting his stock, he promptly joined 
them. About May 1, 1844, the party began the 
long, tedious journey westward. A train of one 
hundred wagons comprised the caravan. Spring 
floods in the bottom lands of the Missouri river 
and its tributaries were the cause of much delay, 
but finally the travelers reached Fort Hall, where 
a consultation was held. Here the majority de- 
cided that the safest route to California was by 
way of Oregon. Some of the men, however, 
disagreed with that conclusion and the differing 
opinions finally resulted in a disruption of the 
party, Marshall and some forty others going on 
horseback by the way of Oregon. They spent 
the winter in that territory, and in June, 1845, 
entered California by way of Shasta. Descend- 
ing the Sacramento Valley, they encamped at 
Cache Creek, about forty miles from where the 
city of Sacramento now stands. Here the party 
separated, a number of them going to Yerba 
Buena— now San Francisco— and others, includ- 
ing Marshall, proceeding to Sacramento, where 
Captain Sutter had already established his fam- 
ous Fort. And here, in July, Marshall entered 
the employ of that well-known pioneer. 

The next two years of Marshall's life, part of 
which was spent as a volunteer under Com- 
modore Stockton in the Bear Flag War, need no 
recounting here, as the only historical portion of 
that period is fully described in another chapter 
of this book. 



6 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

Before the commencement of the Bear Flag 
War Marshall had purchased a large tract of land 
on the north side of Butte Creek, in what is 
now called Butte county. He returned after 
the war only to find that most of his live stock 
had disappeared. Whether it had strayed away 
or had been stolen, he never knew; but at all 
events, his business was ruined. He had but 
little money, so it was necessary for him to find 
some other means of livelihood. The lumbering 
industry attracted him. Accordingly, he return- 
ed to Sutter's Fort in order to secure the co- 
operation of Captain Sutter in the projected 
enterprise. Sutter, being also interested in tim- 
bering, had previously sent out several ex- 
peditions in search of good timber land. 

Marshall wanted to locate a saw-mill on Butte 
Creek; but Samuel Kyburz, Sutter's superintend- 
ent, who had led one of the Sutter expeditions 
and had discovered the site of the present town 
of Coloma, interfered in favor of the latter place. 
Nevertheless, Marshall deserves the credit of 
selecting the actual site upon which the mill was 
afterwaid built. 

Coloma, first named "Culloomah" by the 
Indians, was situated in a little valley along the 
South Fork of the American river, in what is 
now a portion of El Dorado county. After 
Captain Sutter, upon Kyburz's advice, had chosen 
his location, Marshall, accompanied by several 
Indian guides, went over the ground carefully, 
in search of a suitable mill site. 

The hills north of the river were very rugged 
and precipitous, but on the south the declivity 
was more gradual, and here, on a point of land 
formed by a curve in the stream, Marshall found 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 7 

an ideal location for the building. The water 
power was ample and the surrounding hills were 
covered with timber. 

After marking out the proposed location of his 
mill and examining the neighborhood as to its 
adaptability for the transportation of lumber, 
Marshall returned to the Fort, told Sutter of the 
result of his explorations and concluded by an- 
nouncing that all he needed now was a partner 
with capital, to assist him to build and run the 
mill. Sutter immediately offered to co-operate 
with him in the undertaking. There was some 
delay, occasioned mainly by the interference of 
other persons; but on the 19th of August, 1847, a 
partnership was effected. It was agreed that 
Sutter should furnish the capital for erecting the 
mill on a location selected by Marshall, who was 
to be the active partner, and to run the mill, for 
which service he was to receive a stated com- 
pensation. They also agreed, verbally, that if 
California remained a Mexican possession at the 
end of the war, Sutter, being a citizen of Mexico, 
should own the mill site, but Marshall should 
still retain rights to mill privileges and the cut- 
ting of timber. On the other hand, if California 
were ceded to the United States, Marshall, as an 
American citizen, should be the owner of the 
property. The formal articles of partnership 
were drawn up by General John Bidwell, then a 
clerk in Suiter's store, and witnessed by Bid- 
well and Samuel Kyburz, Sutter's business man- 
ager, who, at the time of his death, many years 
later, was the oldest pioneer in El Dorado county. 

Peter L. Wimmer, with his family, and six or sev- 
en mill-hands, were hired by Marshall; and with 
seveml wagon loads of material, provisions, tools 



8 PIONEERvS OF EL DORADO. 

and other necessaries, the party started for Co- 
loma. The building of the mill was begun with- 
out delay and the work proceeded rapidly. 

Besides Peter L. Wimmer, the following men 
were in Marshall's employ: William Scott, James 
Bargee, Alexander Stephens, Jas. Brown, William 
Johnson and Henry Bigler, 

Wimmer had charge of eight or ten Indians, 
who were employed at that time in throwing 
out the larger stones excavated while the mill- 
race was being constructed, during the day. At 
night, the gate of the fore-bay being raised, the 
water entered and carried away the sand, gravel 
and the smaller stones. 

Such were the conditions at Coloma on that 
momentous 24th of January, 1848* — a day mark- 
ing the real beginning of a commonwealth which 
was destined to be the centre of civilization and 
of progress on the Pacific Coast of North America. 
In later years other and more bustling commun- 
ities have crowded our humble mountain towns 
into the background, yet it is a matter of history 
that the treasure discovered in a little lumber 
camp among the hills of El Dorado county first 
drew the attention of the world to California's 
inexhaustible resources, its matchless harbors 
and the grandeur of its mountains, coasts and 
valleys. 

That morning Marshall had gone out as usual 
to oversee the work. After shutting off the wa- 
ter he walked down the tail-race in order to as- 



* January 19 is often erroneously given as the date of Mar- 
shall's discovery of gold at Coloma. However, John S. Hittell, 
the historian, found entries made in the diaries of Henry W. Big- 
ler, Captain John A. Sutter and Azariah Smith, giving January 
24, 1848, as the actual date of the event, thus settling the matter 
beyond all controversy. 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 9 

certain what amount of sand and gravel had been 
removed during the night. This had long been 
a custom of his, for he believed that there were 
minerals in the mountains, but when he confided 
his ideas to his partner, Sutter had only laughed 
at him. 

He walked to the lower end of the race and 
was examining the mass of debris which lay there 
when suddenly his attention was attracted by a 
small glittering object in a crevice, on a riffle of 
soft granite, a few inches under the water. Upon 
picking up the substance, he found it to be heavy 
and of a peculiar color. After studying it atten- 
tively for a few minutes, he concluded that the 
mineral was either mica, sulphurets of copper, or 
gold. But it was too heavy for mica. He re- 
membered that gold is malleable and that sulphur- 
ets of copper is brittle. Placing the specimen on 
aflat stone, he struck it sharply with another 
stone. Instead of cracking or scaling off, the sub- 
stance merely bent under the blow, proving con- 
clusively to Marshall that it was gold. 

We do not know whether Marshall fully real- 
ized the vast importance of his discovery. But he 
was a practical, unemotional sort of personage, 
and after showing the nugget to his men, he went 
about his work in the usual manner. Nevertheless, 
he observed closely, and in a few days had col- 
lected several ounces of the metal. Though he felt 
certain that it was gold, other persons were skep- 
tical, so he resolved to take some of it down to 
Sutter's Fort, where it could be tested with chem- 
icals. About four days later he had to go down 
there after provisions and he took three ounces of 
the specimens with him. 

On his ride to the Fort, Marshall examined the 
river-banks in the hope of finding a suitable lo- 



10 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

cation for a lumber yard, whither the timber from 
the mill could be floated. While thus occupied 
in exploring the country, he discovered gold in 
two other places — in a ravine among the foothills 
and also in the neighborhood now called Mormon 
Island. 

He slept under an oak tree that night, and rode 
up to the Fort about nine o'clock the next morn- 
ing. Dismounting from his horse, he entered 
Sutter's office, and after attending to the business 
which had brought him there, he showed Sutter 
his newly-found treasure. 

The Captain was astonished, but he refused to 
believe that the specimens were gold. Where- 
upon Marshall asked for nitric acid, and a vaquero 
was sent to the gunsmith's to borrow some of the 
chemical. Meanwhile Sutter produced a pair of 
small balances, and after placing three dollars and 
twenty-five cents, silver — all the small change in 
the Fort — on one side of the scales, the dust was 
weighed. As Marshall had foreseen, the speci- 
mens out-weighed the silver. Sutter's skepticism 
began to fade, and a subsequent test with nitric 
acid removed all doubts as to the value of Mar- 
shall's discovery. 

The wide-spread excitement which ensued is 
without a parallel in the world's history. From 
every quarter of the globe men started for the 
new "El Dorado." Many came by boat, over the 
long, tedious, and often dangerous, route around 
Cape Horn ; others chose the shorter and safer 
trip by way of the Isthmus of Panama; while still 
others, probably ,the majority, rode horse-back 
or mule-back or in big "prairie schooners" across 
"the plains", where they were hourly exposed 
to sudden attacks from savage Indians, and where 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 11 

they frequently encountered the even more dread- 
ed peril of starvation. Many a whitened skeleton, 
of man and of beast, found afterward on every 
overland trail, bore awful testimony to that mad 
lust for gold which led men to sever all the ties of 
kindred and to brave hardships which under any 
other circumstances would have seemed unendur- 
able. But such was the pioneer spirit, the force 
behind all of California's greatness, and which 
seems to gain added strength from every disaster. 

Yet it was not alone the desirable element of 
society which joined in that wild rush for the 
gold-fields of California. Almost every type of 
humanity, from the highest to the lowest, was 
represented in that remarkable exodus. The 
slums and haunts of vice of every large city in 
the world contributed a contingent of libertines 
and criminals. It was this infusion of the scum 
of mankind into our mining-camps which pro- 
duced conditions necessitating the adoption of 
the stern repressive measures of 'Vigilance com- 
mittees' ' during the earlier years of the State's 
history. And even today, throughout the Pacific 
Coast states, the evil effects of that indiscriminate 
mingling of men of all sorts in those careless 
times is plainly manifested in the leniency with 
which the majority of Far Western people are 
disposed to regard the frequent indulgence of 
many young persons in various forms of debauch- 
ery. 

With the rapid inrush of the gold-seekers and 
the consequent growth of business, naturally cit- 
ies arose. San Francisco and Sacramento, built 
of tents and wooden shanties, became the prin- 
cipal shipping points for the mines. To these 
towns, also, many miners went at intervals to 



12 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

squander their wealth in gambling and other dis- 
sipations. Money came so easily in those gold- 
en days that comparatively few men gave any 
thought to the future. Innumerable fortunes 
were made only to be wasted in riotous and ex- 
travagant living. 

It was to be expected that crime would result 
from such conditions, particularly in the cities. 
Sundry bands of roughs and desperadoes were 
early organized for the purpose of preying upon 
earnings of industrious neighbors. One such 
gang styled "The Hounds," came under Mar- 
shall's observation in a strange manner. 

In October, 1848, Marshall had gone out on a 
prospecting expedition and had encamped one 
night in a ravine, Johntown creek, between Gar- 
den Valley and Alabama Flat, some three miles 
from Coloma. He was camping about half- 
way up one side of the ravine. By the time 
supper was eaten night had fallen. 

Suddenly he was startled by a signal in the 
direction of the creek. Marshall answered it, 
and immediately the signa^was repeated by some 
other person in the woods above him. Mar- 
shall's suspicions were aroused and he deter- 
mined to investigate. He suspected that he 
had unwittingly fallen upon the rendezvous of 
a band of outlaws. 

After carefully extinguishing his camp-fire and 
removing his provisions, he tied his horse to a 
near-by tree, and grasping his rifle, stole cau- 
tiously up the hill in the direction whence the 
last signal had come. His were the instincts of 
an experienced frontiersman and not a sound of 
breaking twig or rustling leaf betrayed his move- 
ments. Reaching the trunk of a large tree, he 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 13 

was about to climb over it when the sound of 
someone whispering on the further side arrested 
his footsteps. He instantly crouched low, in a 
position where he could both see and hear, 
There were two men, and Marshall heard one of 
them whisper, ''Who gave the signal from the 
middle ground?" Upon learning that the signal 
had evidently come from some unknown person, 
the men betrayed some uneasiness; but, seeing 
no signs of any intruder, they concluded that their 
ears had deceived them, so they proceeded di- 
rectly with the business of their meeting. 

Marshall listened intently. What he heard as- 
sured him that there was an organized band of 
robbers in the neighborhood and that one of 
these two men was their lieutenant. He heard 
them discuss plans for the future, saw them ex- 
change the countersign and even recognized the 
lieutenant as a well-known acquaintance. The 
outlaws finally separated and left, and Marshall, 
returning to the camp, rolled himself in his 
blankets and slept. 

Reaching Coloma, he told some friends of his 
discovery, but he refused to divulge the names 
of any of the gang, because he knew that such 
an action would virtually be the signing of his 
own death warrant. 

Shortly afterwards a man named Smith of 
Hangtown — now Placerville — determined to 
raise a posse for the pursuit of the robbers. 
Smith was encouraged in th ; s resolve by a 
French burglar, a member of the gang who had 
been captured and had sought to save himself 
by informing on his companions in evil. But 
Smith was deluded by the Frenchman, who 
succeeded in enlisting several of the outlaws 



14 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

themselves in the posse, and consequently the 
hunt was a miserable fiasco. 

Efforts were made to induce Marshall to dis- 
close his knowledge of the leadership of the 
band; but Marshall, fearing for his own life, per- 
sistently declined to reveal any facts in connec- 
tion with the robbers. He knew the law at that 
time could not protect him from the swift and 
certain vengeance of such a gang of cut-throats. 
In fact it was dangerous to mention the out- 
laws in public. The grocer, the saloonkeeper, 
the blacksmith, the very hotel-keeper who fur- 
nished him room and board might be members 
of the band. 

Despite Marshall's caution, however, in some 
way the leader of the organization discovered 
that he had been recognized, and from that time 
he began to follow Marshall, 

On one occasion Marshall was out alone on the 
trail, and finding that he was being followed, he 
turned abruptly, and covering the robber with a 
pistol, demanded an explanation of his conduct. 
The fellow replied, * 'I heard that you knew I 
belonged to that gang and I want to know 
if you intend to inform against me?" 

"No," Marshall replied, "I shall attend to my 
own business as long as I am let alone; but if 
I'm to be dogged aud followed about in this way 
I'll not answer for what I might do." 

Thereupon the outlaw rejoined that if Marshall 
kept his promise, he would no longer be annoyed 
by any of the band. This ended the interview. 
It is but just to add that the leader of the gang 
kept his word. This man, Pete Raymond, had 
begun his career in crime by murdering an old 
sea captain, one Bonfisto. He himself eventual- 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 15 

ly met a violent death. 

Soon after his experiences with the robber 
chieftain, Marshall found it necessary to make a 
business trip to San Francisco. While there, he 
stayed at a hotel on Jackson street. One day in 
the reading room Marshall had participated in a 
game of euchre, but becoming tired of the play 
he surrendered his place to another person and 
seated himself beside one of the spectators. 
This man glanced at Marshall keenly, and unob- 
served by anybody else, made the signal of the 
mountain robbers. Marshall answered and the 
stranger announced that he belonged to a band 
in the city, called 'The Hounds," which had 
lately joined the interior organization, of which 
he concluded Marshall was a member. The 
stranger began directly to unfold the plans of 
the gang. One of the schemes projected was 
the burning and sacking of San Francisco, which 
plot was to be carried into execution in three or 
four months. The outlaw divulged the where- 
abouts of the band's headquarters, and described 
all the new grips, pass-words and countersigns. 
He then departed. 

Marshall was in a quandary, although he did 
not fully credit the robber's story. After some 
reflection he resolved to warn a friend who was 
in business near the Plaza. He induced his 
friend to go out of town with him, where there 
would be no danger of eavesdropping, and there 
he related all that had occurred. 

The man listened attentively, and when Mar- 
shall had concluded, said, 

"But you do not mean to keep this to your- 
self? Why do you not go and inform the author- 
ities?" 



16 EL DORADO COUNTY PIONEERS. 

"If anyone will guarantee me a sufficient sum 
to remunerate me for leaving the State within 
twenty-four hours, I will take the risk of reveal- 
ing the plot; but as 1 have only one life, I must 
decline to commit suicide in this way. Besides, 
if I was to tell the authorities, in all probability 
they would not believe me. And even if they 
did, how should I know but the very men who 
received my communication were in league with 
the robbers? The risk is too great and the re- 
ward too small." 

Thus spoke Marshall, and then added the sug- 
gestion that his friend himself might inform the 
authorities. But the other positively declined 
to take the responsibility. 

It is not known whether "The Hounds" were 
actually the incendiaries; nevertheless, San 
Francisco was burned about the time predicted 
by the robber, and Marshall's friend, having been 
warned, succeeded in saving thirty thousand 
dollars from the wreck of his property. 

In the fall of 1848, Sutter sold his interest in 
the Coloma Mills to John Winters and Alden S. 
Bayley for six thousand dollars. The buyers 
had the privilege of cutting timber for mill pur- 
poses, but the title to the land still rested in 
Marshall. Winters and Bayley also bought one- 
third of Marshall's interest for two thousand dol- 
lars, Marshall reserving the pre-emption rights, 
and only relinquishing the timber privilege. 

It was shortly after this transaction that the 
immigrants of 1849 began pouring into the State. 
Naturally at that time Coloma was the Mecca of 
all eyes. In March many new-comers arrived at 
the little camp, and with supreme indifference to 
all existing laws, promptly tpok possession of 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 17 

the land about the mill. Their provisions giving 
out, they seized the work oxen belonging to the 
mill. When pack animals were needed to carry 
their provisions while prospecting, they stole 
Marshall's horses. Such stock was valuable in 
those days and Marshall's loss from the raids was 
at least six thousand three hundred dollars. He 
posted and served notices that he claimed the 
land as an original settler; but the gold-crazed ad- 
venturers were oblivious alike to law or justice. 

At this juncture there occurred an event so se- 
rious as to drive all lesser wrongs from Marshall's 
mind. A number of friendly Sutter Indians and 
several white men had been engaged by Mar- 
shall to make necessary repairs at the saw-mill. 
These Indians were peaceable and industrious, and 
Marshall, through constant fair dealing, had gained 
considerable influence over them and their tribe. 
A party of seven men, lately arrived from Oregon, 
went out on a prospecting trip up the North Fork 
of the American river, and at a point above the 
junction of the North and Middle Forks they came 
upon a large rancheria. As there was good pas- 
turage round about, they determined to camp 
there and allow their horses to rest. After eat- 
ing a luncheon and staking out their horses, they 
proceeded to the rancheria, and finding a number 
of Indian women there, attempted improper fa- 
miliarity with them. The squaws remonstrated 
loudly and their cries brought some of the bucks 
hurrying to the scene. The Indians attempting 
to prevent an outrage, the white men drew their 
revolvers and deliberately shot down three of the 
bucks. Then they rode to Murderer's Bar, on 
the Middle Fork, three or four miles above the 
junction. From here two of the men started out 



18 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

to prospect, leaving their companions in camp. 
After a day or two the prospectors returned and 
found that their partners had moved. Following 
up the trail, the two men reached the new camp, 
only to learn that the entire party had been killed 
by the Indians. 

The two survivors immediately departed for 
Coloma, and upon reaching that place related 
their story and began raising a posse wherewith 
to wreak vengeance upon the Indians who had 
simply punished uncalled-for murder with mur- 
der which was at least excusable. 

Several members of the notorious gang of 
* 'Mountain Hounds" were in Coloma at this time 
and they now saw their opportunity of revenging 
themselves upon the friendly Indians, one of 
whom they suspected of having shadowed their 
band and revealed his discoveries to Marshall. Ac- 
cordingly the outlaws joined the citizens and pur- 
suaded some of them to indulge in a social drink 
before starting in pursuit of the murderers. As 
soon as the majority of the men were sufficiently in- 
toxicated to be influenced easily, it was suggested 
that they seize the Indians at the mill and punish 
them. In a few moments the mill was surround- 
ed by a mob of drunken men, all fully armed, and 
threatening vengeance on the Indians. Before 
this, members of "The Hounds" had notified 
several of the Sutter tribe that Marshall desired to 
see them, and an unusually large number of In- 
dians were gathered at the mill when the attack 
was made. 

Marshall did his best to avert the proposed 
outrage, but the drunken horde were deaf to all 
appeals to judgment and humanity. The leaders 
stated that they simply wanted to make prisoners 
of the Indians; but after the Indians were^ secured 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 19 

the men began drinking again, and under the com- 
bined influence of bad whiskey and worse human 
passions, they were worked into a frenzy and 
commenced an. indiscriminate slaughter of their 
-helpless captives. 

With all the energy at his command, Marshall 
strove to save the fives of his men. He demand- 
ed a fair trial and bitterly denounced the conduct 
of the mob. Finding his arguments of no avail, 
he called around him a few reliable white men 
and told them he would defend the mill and its 
inmates with his rifle if they would assist him. 

His friends knew that resistance would be fu- 
tile in the face of such odds, and tkey urged him 
to save himself, as his bold denunciation of the 
brutal and cowardly assailants had already elicited 
from them dire threats against his own life. 

But Marshall, being inured to danger, was not 
easily daunted. He would have persisted in his 
heroic defense had not his friends providea him 
with a horse and forced him to mount it and leave 
the settlement without delay. 

Eight harmless Indians were deliberately mur- 
dered on this occasion by a mob of scoundrels 
belonging to that vastly superior and highly-civ- 
ilized white race. And there was absolutely 
no justification for the deed. Marshall's Indians 
were constantly employed at the saw-mill in 
Coloma and it is an assured fact that they were 
not near Murderer's Bar when the five guilty 
prospectors were forced to give their own lives 
in payment for the lives of the three Indians 
murdered at the rancheria. Besides, the Indians 
at the mill belonged to a different tribe from those 
who did the killing at Murderer's Bar. 

In view of these facts, and those of similar 



20 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

outrages in which the white men were the ag- 
gressors, can we wonder that a few of the Cal- 
ifornia Indians afterward indulged occasionally 
in bloody reprisals upon these domineering Cau- 
casians? 

So strong was the miners* hostility against 
Marshall, that it was some time before he dared 
to return to Coloma. In using Marshall's name 
to bring the Indians into the mill on that fatal 
day, 'The Hounds" had also succeeded in mak- 
ing the peaceable red men believe that Marshall 
was concerned in the massacre. 

When, finally, Marshall ventured, to go back to 
his old house, he found that the squatters had 
surveyed the ground about the sawmill, divided 
it into town lots, and distributed it among them- 
selves, utterly ignoring the actual owner. 

Hardly had Marshall become settled before he 
was subjected to another form of persecution. 
By some strange process of reasoning, the min- 
ers had conceived the idea that, as Marshall was 
the discoverer of gold, he knew where all that 
precious metal could be found, but that he would 
not reveal the "open sesame" which must un- 
cover the hidden treasure. Accordingly, when- 
ever he went out of town he was followed by 
crowds of men, anxious to find the secret dig- 
gings which they imagined he was going to visit. 
In Coloma his every movement was watched. He 
was asked innumerable questions. Many per- 
sons even made threats in order to secure the 
valuable knowledge which they felt he possess- 
ed. 

In vain did Marshall strive to convince his tor- 
mentors that he knew no more about the loca- 
tion of valuable mines than they did. The more 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 21 

he tried to reason with the men, the stronger 
their suspicions grew, until finally there came a 
day when the whole senseless persecution just 
•escaped ending in a tragedy. 

Whether it was their foolish brooding over 
imaginary wrongs, or the imbibing of an unusual 
amount of whiskey, or both together,that brought 
on the crisis, we do not know. At any rate, the 
miners arose in a body, and evidently devoid of 
all reason, started after Marshall, intending to 
give him the alternative of disclosing the location 
of the rich diggings, or of being taken out of 
town and hanged to the first convenient tree. 
Undoubtedly they would have accomplished 
their dastardly project had not a partner of Mar- 
shall's, Mr. John Winters, hearing of the plot, 
taken steps to engage the mob's attention, and 
succeeded in smuggling the intended victim 
away, directing him to a roadside thicket, where 
a fleet horse awaited him. It was nearly six 
months before Marshall ventured to return, and 
it was some years afterward before this foolish 
persecution finally ceased. 

At this time the mill business began rapidly to 
decline. After Marshall's partners had got out 
the lumber for Sutter's flour mill at Brighton, 
the rush became so great and the excitement grew 
so high that it was practically impossible to get 
work done. Then expensive litigation, arising 
from the action of the squatters, and the cost of 
running the mill — daily wages being sixteen dol- 
lars per hand— shattered the enterprise, and the 
mill was closed. And this was not the end; for 
the very men who had stolen the ground, the 
cattle and the horses owned by Marshall and his 
partners, now deliberately appropriated the tim- 



22 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

bers of the mill to frame shafts and tunnels with, 
dismantled the entire building, and destroyed the 
mill; while the proprietors never received even 
a modicum of recompense for all this damage. 

An idea of the high cost of living in California 
at this time — 1849 — can be gained from the sub- 
joined items taken from books which were kept 
at Sutter's Fort in Sacramento: 

3 lbs. of Cackers .. $3 00 

1 barrel Mess Pork.. ......... 210 00 

2 lbs Mackerel............. 5 00 

1 bottle Lemon Syrup 6 00 

1 bottle. P ickles. , ..... 7 00 

131bsflam 27 U0 

,30 lbs. Sugrar 18 00 

1 canister of Tea.... ;... 13 UO 

1 keg- of Lard 70 50 

1 lb. Butter 2 50 

50 lbs. Beans . . 25 u0 

mo lbs. Flour , 150 00 

13 lbs Salmon...... 13 00 

1 bottle Ale.......... 5 0q 

1 pair of Blankets......*,...... 24 00 

1 Hickory Shirt , 5 00 

2 White Shirts ....... 40 00 

1 pair Shoes . 14 Oil 

iHat.... :..: iooo 

1 Candle .... 3 00 

1 Fine-Tooth Comb ....„ 6 00 

1 Paper Tacks. 3 00 

41bs Nails 3 00 

lib Powder........ 10 0# 

1 Colt's Revolver......... 75 00 

As most supplies used in Coloma during 1849 
were purchased at Sutter's Fort, the reader can 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 23- 

readily understand why wages were so high and: 
business enterprises so uncertain in that com- 
munity. 

Marshall returned to Coloma only to find his 
possessions scattered and hte land occupied by 
men who scoffed at his claims. Though an ex- 
perienced frontiersman, he had none of the bus- 
iness instinct necessary to cope with unscrupu- 
lous men of the world. Consequently he was 
continually imposed upon wherever he sojourned: 
in El Dorado county. His credibility and lack of 
combativeness proved his undoing. 

It would have been natural to expect that a 
sentiment of gratitude, if no other feeling, to- 
ward the man who had done so much for Cali- 
fornia, would have deterred most persons from 
interfering with the discoverer's private mining 
operations. But the reverse of this was true. 
Time after time was Marshall driven from his 
gravel claims by bands of cowardly miscreants 
who recognized no law but that of brute force. 
But despite the constant injustice done him, EI 
Dorado's best-known pioneer always retained 
his inherent kindliness of heart. The following 
incident well illustrates that part of his nature: 

In the summer of 1849, during an expedition 
between the Middle and South Forks of the Yu- 
ba river, northwest of El Dorado county, he 
came one day upon a man lying beside the trail, 
apparently almost dead. Marshall halted, and: 
after giving some refreshment to the sufferer, 
learned that his name was Jack Abbott. He had 
been out prospecting with several other persons, 
but he had been taken ill, and his inhuman com- 
panions had left him to die. 

Having revived Abbot, Marshall lifted him 



24 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

upon his own horse, and walking alongside* 
took him to his camp. By careful nursing and 
the use of simple Indian remedies, such as his 
experience with the aborigines had taught him 
to apply, he soon had the man convalescent 
He told Marshall that he was a member of a good 
New York family and that he had wealthy 
friends; but he had fallen into evil ways and 
had been sent to California in the hope that a 
term of frontier life would have a salutary effect. 

As Abbot became stronger, he was allowed to 
take daily rides on Marshall's horse. And when 
his health was nearly restored, Marshall suggest- 
ed to him one day that he was now able to do 
light work and that he had better begin the next 
morning. A,bbot consented, and mounting for 
his usual ride, started off. Neither the rider, 
nor the horse, saddle or bridle, were ever seen 
by Marshall again. This incident cut Marshall to 
the quick. An act of such apparent ingratitude 
must needs shake his faith in human nature. 

Some time afterward Marshall met one of Ab- 
bott's friends in San Francisco. Upon hearing of 
Abbott's disappearance, the man volunteered the 
opinion that in all piobability his friend had fall- 
en a victim to some accident. As a good reason 
for this belief, the stranger related that a few 
months after Abbott's disappearance the skele- 
tons of a man and a horse— one sitting on the 
ground and the other tied to a nearby tree — had 
been discovered in a wood not far from Marshall's 
camp. But Marshall listened incredulously and 
he always believed that the skeleton story was 
a pure fabrication, invented by Abbott's friend. 

In direct contrast to the foregoing narrative 
was an amusing experience of Marshall's during 



PIONEERS OF EL DOKADO. 25 

the winter of 1849. 

A lawyer named Robinson—late: a participant 
in the Lecompton riots in Kansas — had squatted 
upon a forty-acre lot owned by Sutter and situ- 
ated on the low, marshy ground now occupied 
by the city of Sacramento, Meeting Marshall one 
day, Robinson offered to sell him a portion of 
the land. But Marshall replied, 

"What title have you got to the land?" 

"Oh, that's all right," said Robinson. "It's only- 
necessary to have it surveyed and recorded." 

"Humphl" Marshall rejoined contemptuously,, 
"have you got no other title?" 

"Other title!" Robinson repeated sharply. 
"No, sir! No other title is necessary." 

"Well," said Marshall, "if I wanted to buy, I 
should prefer Sutter's title. But now tell me, 
how long do you expect to be able to maintain 
your present position?" 

"Maintain it indeed!" the other cried angrily. 
"I should like to se& the power that would oust 
me!" 

"Well," Marshall said quietly,/' what force have 
you got?" 

"I can bring fifty men to back me in Pa few 
hours," asserted Robinson. 

"Is that all the force you can secure," asked 
Marshall. 

"No, sir, it is not," the squatter retorted. "In 
three days I can muster five hundred rifles to 
support my claims!" 

"Is that all you can do?" said Marshall, with 
exasperating insistence. 

"Yes, sir!" Robinson cried frantically, "and 
enough, too! I'd like to see Sutter, or anybody 
else, turn me off this land!" 

"Well, sir," said Marshall with a subdued 



26 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

chuckle, "it ain't no kind o' use. I'll bet you 
anything you like that you'll be driven off this 
lot in less than two months." 

The squatter was furious, and vauntingly told 
of what he would do to anyone who tried to dis- 
possess him. Marshall turned away, laughing. 

In less than two months the river rose sudden- 
ly, and in a few hours Robinson's stolen land 
was several feet under water; and as the fright- 
ened squatter paddled his canoe vigorously for 
the high ground, a man on the bank cried, 

"Aha! Marshall was right, after all!" 

Then the discomfited Robinson realized what 
the power was which not even five hundred 
armed men could resist. 

In the following summer Marshall went up 
Antoine Canyon, close to the head of the North 
Branch of the Middle Fork of the American river, 
and began mining there. Shortly afterward oc- 
curred one of the most tragic experiences in 
all his career. 

Crirrte was rife in California mthosewild days 
but the tragedy narrated below is unique in its 
horribleness. 

Before Marshall had worked long in Antoine 
Canyon, a great excitement was created by the 
arrival of a party of Ohio men, who brought a 
large quantity of gold which they claimed to 
have taken from a neighboring creek, the local- 
ity of which they refused to reveal. Later sev- 
eral parties were raised to search for the sup- 
posed bonanza, which was named the ''Ohio 
Diggings" in honor of the alleged discoverers. 
Five or six bands started out in various direc- 
tions, but all returned in a short time, weary and 
discouraged. Then Marshall was prevailed upon 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 27 

to join a new party.. They spent several weeks 
in the mountains, searching carefully and patient- 
ly, but without avail. At last, their supplies 
giving out, they were compelled to turn home- 
ward. Arriving at a point between the north 
and middle branches of the Middle Fork, they 
began to follow what appeared to be an old In- 
dian trail, evidently long disused. The ascent 
here was rough and difficult. Suddenly, around 
a sharp turn where the path skirted an out- 
cropping, rocky bluff, they came upon a small, 
level opening, so darkened by encircling trees as 
to give the appearance of dim twilight. A pleas- 
ant little stream of water ran along the centre of 
the dell, and the grass all around was green and 
luxuriant. "A good place to camp," thought 
Marshall, who was riding ahead, Coming so 
abruptly from the bright light into that semi- 
darkness, at first his eyes could distinguish 
nothing clearly. But by the time he had reached 
the spring and dismounted, his vision was as 
keen as ever. He looked about him and for a 
moment his heart quailed at the horror of the 
thing he saw. 

A few yards distant lay the skeletons of a horse 
and mule, the back of one bearing a Spanish sad- 
dle, and a packsaddle lying upon the bones of the 
other. Near at hand was a human skeleton, evi- 
dently that of a Spaniard, as a pair of trousers 
with leather stripes down the sides was still on 
the body. A shout from one of Marshall's com- 
panions announced further revelations. A second 
skeleton had been found some distance from the 
first. Both showed evidence of foul play. In 
the first, a bullet hole was discovered in the skull, 
while the other had a wound in the breast. A 



28 JAMES W. MARSHALL. 

third skeleton was round, its position inclicating- 
that the man had been struck from behind while 
in the act of leaping over a log,' for when found 
one foot was caught on the log and the body was 
bent backward over it. 

Examination of the wounds, taken in conjunc- 
tion with the evident occupation of the victims, 
proved conclusively to Marshall and his compan- 
ions that white men had done this evil deed and 
that the motive of the crime had been robbery. 
After the excitement occasioned by these dis- 
coveries had subsided, the men fell to discussing 
the matter. Then Marshall, who had continued 
to examine the remains intently and quietly, 
stepped in front of his comrades, and raising his 
hand to gain their attention, announced, 

•'Boys, we have struck the Ohio Diggings!" 

Startled, the men looked at one another in a 
puzzled manner, and then, turning to Marshall, 
demanded his meaning. He replied, in substance, 
as follows: 

Previous to this, three Spaniards, who were 
engaged in mining, found a rich crevice on Van 
Fleet creek, which adjoined and ran parallel with 
Antoine creek. They always bought supplies 
from a trader named James Williams, who lived 
between the two creeks. Thus it was natural 
that they invariably placed their earnings in Wil- 
liams' care, as they feared such treasure would be 
unsafe in their unprotected cabin. Frequently 
they came to the store, depositing gold, returning 
with provisions, until finally seventy-five pounds 
of the precious metal had accumulated. Then 
Williams, wishing to move his business to some 
other mining district, sent word to the Spaniards 
to come and take away their gold. 



PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 29 

In nearly all early mining camps there were to 
"be found some disreputable persons who rarely 
worked, and who were constantly on the lookout 
for an opportunity to plunder the unwary of their 
hard-earned wealth. Several men of this descrip- 
tion were habitually loafing about Williams' store 
feigning to be engaged in prospecting, but in real- 
ity spending their time in card playing and drink- 
ing. These persons had watched the Spaniards 
closely at various times, and had said frequently 
that they intended to learn where the Spaniards 
dug their gold. Accordingly, on the day when 
the partners were to remove their treasure, little 
attention was paid to the remark of one of the 
loafers that they would follow them and discover 
their diggings. The Spaniards came and departed 
and no mortal eyes save those of the cowardly 
■assassin^ beheld the tragedy enacted in that lone- 
ly glen. 

Afterward the murderers had gone into Bird's 
Valley with their ill-gotten gain and related the 
story of the secret diggings which had caused 
such great excitement and set scores of men to 
chasing a will-o'-the-wisp over the foot-hills. 

Marshall was right. This spot was indeed the 
^'Ohio Diggings' 1 , as these grim and ghastly 
iimages of the former owners dumbly testified. 

It is a sad commentary upon those lawless 
-days that there is no record of any punishment's 
being meted out to the perpetrators of this most 
atrocious crime. 

A few extracts from the minutes of the Tenth 

District Court, as it appeared in session at Co- 

iloma during the summer of 1850, will give the 

reader some conception of the lax administration 

*of justice in the courts of early California. Ort 



30 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

page 102 of "Book A," the following record ap- 
pears: 

"Our action has been embarrassed by inability 
to obtain the attendance of witnesses in crimin- 
al suits, and an apathy on the part of the people 
to come forward and prefer charges for investi- 
gation. We are unable to account for this indif- 
ference, unless we attribute it to the transient 
character of the citizens and their unwillingness 
to abandon their daily pursuits, or to their want 
of confidence in the officers of the law and the 
certainty of public justice being administered. 
We cannot but think that the charge recently 
made of the impotency of the laws is unjust in 
its bearing. That lies with the people, and not 
with the Government." 

Whether or not the citizens had reason for 
their "want of confidence in the officers of the 
Jaw," the reader may judge from the subjoined 
quotation from the minutes of a typical case. 
This was an action on the part of Marshall's part- 
ner, Winters, to collect a debt: 

"John Winters et. al. vs. Arnold Thel- 
hover. 

"On motion of counsel, it is ordered by the 
Court that a venire issue to the Coroner to sum- 
mon a jury of six good and discreet electors to 
serve as jurors to try this cause. Now comes 
the Coroner and returns into Court the follow- 
ing jurors:"— here follow the names — "On mo- 
tion of plaintiff's attorney for leave to withdraw 
his account, that was assigned to them, motion 
sustained. It was, therefore, ordered by the 
Court that leave be granted, and after the jury 
being duly sworn and the cause submitted to 
them, after hearing the evidence in the cause, 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 31 

retired to their room, made up their verdict for 
plaintiff for the sum of two thousand, 
fifty-nine dollars and seventy-five cents. 
It is ordered by the Court that judg- 
ment go against the plaintiff for a like sum. It is 
further ordered that the jurors be allowed three 
dollars each." 

At this period J.S. Thomas was District Judge, 
and Colonel William Rogers — of Indian war fame 
(?)— was Sheriff of the county. 

Shortly after the foregoing case was tried, a 
shameless, though very amusing, trial occurred 
in Placerville, which town had meanwhile be- 
come the county-seat. 

A miner had been charged with assault upon a 
man who had endeavored to jump his claim. 
The trial of the defendant was begun at eleven 
o'clock at night, and the Judge, in the kindness 
of his heart, varied the monotony of the proceed- 
ings by adjourning the court every few minutes, 
in order to visit a saloon, ihe Judge, Sheriff, 
deputies, prosecutor, counsel, prisoner, witnes- 
ses and jury would go out in a body and joy- 
fully drink one another's health at the adjacent 
bar. As a result of these convivial intermissions, 
five o'clock the next morning found maudlin law- 
yers addressing a much befuddled jury, on behalf 
of equally intoxicated clients. An inebriated 
Judge having delivered a remarkable charge, a 
verdict of acquittal was rendered by the jury. 
Thereupon the Judge reeled from the Bench and 
approaching the defendant, oongratulated him 
warmly, and remarked with fervor that he hoped, 
that he had "hit the prosecutor an awful lick." 

At another time, when an attempt had been 
made to jump a claim, a Justice of the Peace is- 



32 JAMES W. MARSHALL. 

sued repeated injunctions, restraining the lawful? 
owners from working their ground, and as they paid 
no attention, he fined them again and again. But 
when the Sheriff appeared on the ground to en- 
force the Court's order, he was confronted by an 
array of revolvers that effectually quenched his 
official eagerness, Afterward the owner of the- 
claim went before the Justice and told his Honor- 
that he had better withdraw the injunctions and; 
remit the fines, or there might be trouble; and. 
that gentleman, realizing the significance of the 
remark, promptly consented. 

From these instances, it will be seen that poor 
or weak plaintiffs had very little chance of ob- 
taining justice in the courts. It was small won- 
der that Marshall, mild and yielding in. disposi- 
tion, saw all his most valuable claims stolen from 
him one by one in those days when the pro- 
ceedings of our tribunals were often a laughing 
stock, and when the menace of a rifle, a revolver 
or the hangman's noose was the most frequent 
arbiter, 

For several years Marshall followed a wander- 
ing life, and upon returning to Coloma bought 
the ground whereon his cabin and monument 
now stand. Here he prospered for some time 
in the grape-raising industry. In 1862 his old 
cabin was destroyed by fire, and the present 
cabin was erected in its place. 

It was perhaps natural that a person of Mar- 
shall's easy, sociable disposition should become 
addicted to that besetting sin of many Califor- 
nians, the love of tippling — a weakness which 
eventually wrecked his life as it has likewise 
ruined the careers of a myriad of other Americans. 

During 1869 and 1870 Marshall made two lee- 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 33 

luring tours, which proved successful financially 
so long a? he avoided the barrooms. 

His latest years were spent mostly atKelsey— 
now called Slatington— , an old-time mining 
camp about six miles from Coloma. The Legis- 
lature of California appropriated the following 
pensions for Marshall's support, in recognition of 
his services to the State: 

Feb. 2, 1872, $200 per month for two years. 

Mar. 23, 1874, $100 per month for two years. 

April 1, 1876, $50 per month for two years. 

But these large appropriations turned out to be 
a curse instead of a blessing. Marshall in his 
free-hearted manner, scattered money indiscrim- 
inately among friends and parasites, and in- 
dulged his fondness for spirituous liquors until 
he became nothing more than a common drunk- 
ard, unfit for success in any occupation. But 
even these facts did not warrant the Legislature 
in cutting off all further appropriations. What- 
ever his faults, James W. Marshall was the real 
discoverer of gold in California, as attested by 
the sworn affidavits of Samuel Kyburz and 
other well-known pioneers; and for that reason 
alone the State should have given him, until 
death, a pension sufficient to keep him in comfort. 

But no stronger argument could be made 
against the liquor evil than the mere spectacle of 
this honest, kind-hearted man— whose discovery 
had given us a commonwealth, and who had 
within him so much of true nobility— yielding to 
a degrading appetite, and in consequence spend- 
ing his declining years in poverty and shame. 

When the end came, in 1885, there had been 
no warning of death's approach. In the after- 
noon of a summer day, Marshall, sitting upon his 



34 PIONEERS tOF EL, DORADO* 

front porch with some neighbors, pointed to 
some dying plum trees and said, "That's the way 
I feel, part dead and part alive. That's the way 
we all will go, one by one/' 

As he felt unwell, he took a dose of physic at 
bedtime. In the morning, his partner, Hill, hear- 
ing his friend stirring, asked him if he had 
heard the noises in the upper part of the house 
during the night. Marshall replied that he had, 
and that the disturbance was caused by the rats 
in the garret. Hill then went out rabbit-hunting, 
and, upon his return, began to prepare breakfast. 
Soon after he spoke to Marshall, who was lying 
dressed upon the bed, his hat pushed down over 
his eyes, and his right arm and leg hanging 
down, the leg touching the floor. Receiving no 
answer, Hill touched his partner, and finding 
him motionless, hurried in alarm to the door and 
called to Mr. Sipp and Tom Allen, two of his 
neighbors, and told them something was the 
matter with Marshall. 

They immediately ran over, and Mr. Sipp. put- 
ting his hand on Marshall's breast, found that the 
heart had stopped beating, yet the warmth still 
remaining in the body indicated that life had 
been extinct only a few moments. 

Death had come from natural causes, and not 
from starvation, as some have asserted. There 
was an ample supply of provisions in the cabin. 

Thus died James Wilson Marshall, on the tenth 
day of August, 1885, at the age of 74 years and 
10 months. He was buried in Coloma, on a hill- 
side overlooking the site of his world-renowned 
discovery. Placerville Parlor No. 9, Native Sons 
of the Golden West, initiated a movement to 
erect a monument to mark the resting-place and 



: < : ' 



■V 










MARSHALL MONUMENT. 
Photo by Charles Elmer Upton. 



JAMES W. MARSHALL. 35 

commemorate the services of our only pioneer 
whose fame is international. On May 3, 1890, 
the monument was unveiled in the presence of 
a vast concourse of other pioneers and native 
sons and daughters of the new California. 

That James W. Marshall made little of his op- 
portunities, all must admit; some persons have 
cynically remarked that a whiskey bottle best 
typifies his life. If that sentiment be true of him, 
then a carved representation of a liquor flask 
would likewise be a most fitting decoration on 
ihe tombstones of innumerable tenants of our 
cities of the dead, on the graves of men slain by 
drink, but who were consigned to earth amid 
pompous rites and eulogized in fulsome news- 
paper articles. 

And when all the evil has been said, as 
evil may truly be told in some 
degree of every human being, the fact re- 
mains that every Californian, whatever his per- 
sonal bias, owes an inestimable debt of gratitude 
to the memory of James Wilson Marshall, 



II. 

MATHIAS LAUBER, 

WITH GENERAL KEARNEY IN '46. 



Alsace, France, January 6, 1823. 

That was the place and the date of Mathias 
Lauber's birth. Little is known of his life dur- 
ing the few years spent in that primitive corner 
of early France. But in May, 1830, the family 
embarked for the United States. Reaching the 
city of New York, they took steamer for Albany* 
and from there journeyed along the Erie canal to 
Buffalo, then a small village. Here they halted 
and the father, buying land near Lake Erie, went 
to work. 

Nearly twelve years later, Mathias Lauber, a 
lad of nineteen, eager for a larger view of the 
world, broke away from home ties and went to 
the new and growing settlement of Milwaukee. 



pioneersof;el dorado. 37 

Here he worked for fifty cents a day and board, 
at helping fill in swamps to make ground— -"wa- 
ter lots" — whereon houses could be built. In 
harvest time he secured a job on a farm some 
twenty miles away from town. At the season's 
close he was paid in "wildcat paper" money, the 
only currency to be had. Leaving Milwaukee, 
he traveled to Cleveland, thence to MassiHon, 
and finally to Canton, Ohio, where an uncle lived. 

The young man's roving propensities were 
still unsatisfied. In 1844, he enlisted in Com- 
pany C, First Dragoons, of General Kearney's 
forces, then at St, Louis; was sent, with four or 
five hundred other recruits, to Jefferson Barracks; 
thence up the Missouri river to Fort Leaven- 
worth, Kansas, where they were formed into 
companies at headquarters and were compelled 
to drill twice a day. In 1845, when Colonel 
Fremont was commissioned by the government 
to find a pass to Oregon, Kearney was sent to 
South Pass, in the Rocky Mountains, where he 
made a treaty with the Indians and gave them 
presents, in order to secure all white settlers 
against molestation from the impetuous red men. 
Soon after began Kearney's long, tedious expedi- 
tion through the Southwest to California. At 
the Rio Grande river Kit Carson, the famous 
scout, was attached to the General's forces as a: 
guide, for the topography of the great South- 
west was an open book to Carson. 

It was an arduous journey, long to be remem- 
bered. Provisions gave out, clothing became 
rags, and the troops reached Southern California 
hungry, barefoot and all but discouraged. Their 
horses and pack-animals had starved to death 
on the deserts, so that for many miles the men 



38 JAMES W. MARSHALL. 

had been compelled to struggle on afoot with 
their burdens. After reaching San Diego, they 
lived solely upon beef until tbe arrival of a 
schooner of provisions, some two or three weeks 
later. They remained in San Diego about five 
weeks, until they were fitted out for another 
journey, and then they started for Los Angeles, 
Meanwhile the Bear Flag war had begun. In 
the summer of 1846 the several hundred Ameri- 
can settlers on the rich farming lands of the Sac- 
ramento valley heard that Castro, the Mexican 
commander of the territory, was coming from 
Monterey with a large armed force, for the pur- 
pose of driving all Americans out of Northern 
California and confiscating their property. Ac- 
cordingly, many of the settlers gathered at Fre- 
mont's camp near the Marys vi lie Buttes. A 
number of these Americans captured a large band. 
of horses owned by the Mexican government; 
then, considering that this offense necessitated 
further warlike measures, the settlers deter- 
mined to attack the Sonoma military post, cap- 
ture its commandant, M. G. Vallejo [vahl-ya-ho] 
and defy the Mexican government. Accordingly, 
-a body of men, led first by Merritt, and afterward 
by William B. Ide, took possession of Sonoma 
June 14, 1846, sent Vallejo and two others as 
prisoners to Sutter's Fort, and thus put an end to 
Mexican rule in Sonoma; while Ide completed 
the revolution by issuing a proclamation of inde- 
pendence. They named their newly-acquired 
possession the "California Republic" and put the 
name, in large letters, on a flag of coarse, white 
cotton cloth with a strip of red flannel sewed 
along the lower edge, and with a large star and 
a figure supposed to represent a grizzly bear 



PIONEERS OF EL DORADO, 39 

painted in red near the upper edge. Thus the 
"Bear Flag Nation," comprising only a few doz- 
en men, claimed to succeed Mexican authority 
in California. A few days afterward Colonel 
Fremont secured control of the infant "nation",, 
Early in July news came of the outbreak of the 
Mexican War. The Bear Flag was pulled down, 
and the Stars and Stripes were substituted. 

United States naval commanders on the Pacific 
had been ordered to seize all Californian ports as 
soon as possible after war began. Commodore 
Sloat sailed up the coast from Mexico and, on 
July 7, 1846, raised the American flag over the 
old custom-house in Monterey, where the Mexi- 
can banner had long floated. By the end of a 
week the American colors were also flying at San 
Francisco and at Sutter's Fort, in the Sacramento- 
valley. Within a little more than a year's time, 
during which an uprising of Mexicans in Southern 
California had been put down by Fremont and 
Commodore Stockton, all of the territory from 
Oregon to Lower California was in control of the 
American forces. There had been no hard fight- 
ing, and probably not more than seventy men on 
both sides were killed in California during the 
entire war. The treaty of peace, in 1848 r con- 
firmed the title of the United States to all oT the 
conquered territory, and the inglorious Mexican 
war thus ended profitably, but with little honor 
for the invading Americans,. 

General Kearney had co-operated with Com- 
modore Stockton in the Southern California cam- 
paign, and our private, Mathias Lauber, had the 
opportunity of seeing some light skirmishing, 
though nothing occurred which could properly be 
termed a battle. Commodore Stockton had land- 



40 MATHIAS LAUBER. 

ed with four or five hundred sailors and marines 
and two field-pieces, and together with General 
Kearney and his forces, had marched toward Los 
Angeles. 

They stopped for two days at Mission San Luis 
Rey, where some of the men went foraging, broke 
into a wine cellar, finding therein some large casks 
of native wine, and promptly helped themselves 
to the liquor, carrying it away in canteens and 
various camp utensils. Kearney, his curiosity 
aroused by the busy stragglers going and coming 
upon their unholy errands, despatched an orderly 
to make investigations. The orderly went, re- 
ported to his chief, whereupon a sentry was 
placed at the cellar's entrance and strict orders 
were given that each man be allowed a pint of 
wine daily, and no more. 

The expedition again moved forward. But at 
the San Gabriel river they encountered a force of 
Mexicans, who, cannonading from the opposite 
bank, delayed the Americans for a brief period; 
;but no one was killed though some of Kearney's 
;men were injured by the dropping of large boughs, 
cut from the trees by the hurtling balls. Kear- 
ney finally succeeded in getting his cannon across 
the stream, notwithstanding the fact that the riv- 
er-bed was filled with quicksand, and tlae men, 
wading up to their knees in the treacherous bot- 
tom, were compelled to help the mules drag the 
heavy guns. 

But when all were safely landed on the other 
shore, it was the work of a few 'minutes to un- 
limber the cannon. A gun having been wheeled 
into place, Kearney himself aimed it at the foe, 
and the shot dismounted one of the Mexicans' 
cannon and killed several of the enemy besides, 



MATHIAS LAUBER 41 

Then, at word of command, the Americans 
charged at double-quick time upon their assail- 
ants, who fled in confusion, leaving everything 
behind them. The victors camped on the ^battle- 
ground' ' that night, and the next day marched on 
to Los Angeles. 

The Mexican commandant in that garrison, hear- 
ing of Kearney's arrival, sent word, under a flag 
of truce, that if the Americans would promise to 
destroy no property he would surrender the town 
On January 8, 1847, Kearney's forces marched 
into Los Angeles and soon the American flag was 
flying from the fort upon the hill. 

It was but a short time after these occurrences 
that Mathia^ Lauber, among others, received his 
discharge from the company. He went up to 
San Francisco, where he was employed for a brief 
period by a class of men engaged in a very dis- 
reputable traffic. Finding the work very distaste- 
ful, he gave up his job and started for the gold- 
fields. His first stopping-place was Big Bar, on 
the Middle Fork of the American river, in the 
southern portion of Placer county. Here he pros- 
pected. No mining pans were to be had, but the 
prospectors used large wooden bowls imported 
from Mexico. Lauber and his friends worked at 
Big Bar until Christmas, when, their stock of 
provisions being low, they decided not to run the 
risk of wintering there lest a heavy snowfall 
should come and cut them off from the outer 
world. Accordingly they came out past George- 
town and Kelsey, then merely villages of tents, 
and reached Coloma, where they found mer- 
chants with ample supplies of all necessaries, 
though rated at exorbitant prices. Lauber' s party 
bought what they needed and went back to Kel- 



42 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

sey, where they mined till the spring of 1849, 
when they returned to their old camp on Big Bar. 
Not long after this Mathias Lauber witnessed a 
scene which even the passing of many years has 
not effaced from his memory. 

A party of New England men, who had set sail 
from Boston, coming to California by way of the 
Straits of Magellan instead of the usual ocean 
route, in the course of time had reached Placer 
county. Wishing to prospect on Big Bar, they 
journeyed past Auburn Junction and struck the 
trail leading to the former camp. At one place on 
the ridge opposite Lauber's claim an immense 
landslide had occurred at some long-forgotten 
hour, leaving an abrupt, slippery descent of many 
feet of earth, shorn of vegetation, clear to the 
river's edge. Coming along the hill at this point 
one evening, the leader of the Bostonians, at- 
tracted by the flickering light in the camp below, 
inadvertently stepped off the path and in a trice 
was sliding at a terrific rate down that fearful 
slope. The cries of the hapless stranger and 
the sound of rattling pebbles aroused Lauber's 
party just an instant before the victim, with a 
resounding splash, fell into the water. Our 
friends brought him across the river and did all 
in their power to relieve his distress, which ap- 
peared to be mental rather than bodily. Physic- 
ally, he seemed unhurt; but he was wild from 
fright. Within twenty-four hours his hair had 
turned grey and a few days later death ended 
his sufferings. 

During the summer and fall of 1849, Jewish 
peddlers frequently came into the foothills with 
merchandise to sell to the Americans and the 
Indians. Their goods were usually strapped 



MATHIAS LAUBER. 43 

across their backs, while the necessary provi- 
sions were carried on mules. These peddlers, 
like most of their countrymen, were expert 
tradesmen. Reaching a settlement, they would 
pitch their camp and immediately set out a 
tempting display of their wares, consisting, as a 
rule, of gaudy-colored shirts, socks, cheap jew- 
elry and similar articles. A blue or red shirt 
would sell for at least half an ounce of gold dust 
and the Jewish trader would invariably get the 
better part of the bargain, as the settlers had no 
means of weighing their gold. The peddler 
would put the desired article of purchase in one 
side of his scale and insist upon the buyer's 
pouring sufficient gold-dust into the other side 
to balance the goods. But, while the Americans 
were invariably cheated in all these transactions, 
it was the poor, ignorant Indians who suffered 
the worst in their dealings with those rascally 
traffickers. Doubtless my readers can readily 
understand how so many of these self-same 
Jews afterward became wealthy and prominent 
merchants in various California towns. 

The "packers" were the main dependence of 
Californians in those early days. These "pack- 
ers" were men of means, and usually Americans, 
who made regular trips into the mining regions, 
carrying on mule-back extensive stocks of pro- 
visions and other necessaries, as well as some un- 
necessary, though very welcome, articles, such as 
whiskey and similar intoxicants. Generally they 
sold honest goods, and, considering the" great 
cost of transportation from the East, their prices 
were reasonable. 

In the summer following the Big Bar tragedy, 
there occured what is popularly known as "Bill 



44 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

Rogers' Indian War." Four miners, crossing the 
mountains on their way from Placerville to a 
neighboring camp, came across an Indian, accom- 
panied by his squaw. One of the miners at- 
tempting violence to the woman, the Indian de- 
fended his spouse, whereupon the miner drew 
his revolver and deliberately murdered the 
buck. 

Now, the Indians had been made believe that 
they could obtain redress from the nearest magis- 
trate whenever they were molested by the 
whites. Being foolish enough to trust their new 
masters, they accordingly made complaint. Of 
course no notice was taken of their petition. 
They waited in vain for the murderer to be pun- 
ished; then, finally taking the law into their own 
hands, they attacked a party of three miners, 
killing two of them. 

Hearing of the death of their comrades, other 
miners in the county insisted that swift and 
drastic punishment be meted out to the offen- 
ders. Colonel William Rogers, then Sheriff of 
El Dorado county, immediately began to raise a 
force to attack the Indians. The so-called war 
which followed consisted mainly in the murder- 
ing of peaceable Indians and old squaws and the 
storming of deserted rancherias. The two inci- 
dents narrated below are typical examples of the 
whole wretched affair. 

A party of men, fully armed, and led by Major 
McKinney, rode out one day in search of Indians. 
As they were riding along a mountain trail, they 
beheld a peaceable Indian on horseback a short 
distance ahead. With a wild yell the white ruf- 
fians immediately started in pursuit of the un- 
offending red man. At this the Indian spurred 



MATHIAS LAUBER. AS 

his horse, but finding his pursuers gaining on 
him, he jumped from his horse and began run- 
ning at his utmost speed. As the trail was 
rocky and difficult for the horsemen, the Indian 
seemed at first likely to escape; but Major Mc- 
Kinney, who rode a swifter steed than his men, 
finally overtook the fugitive, who, finding him- 
self at bay, turnd and fitted an arrow to his bow. 
Then as the Major, bending forward, discharged 
the contents of his gun into the Indian's body, 
the dying man sent his arrow up to the feather 
in the breast of his cowardly assailant, killing 
him almost instantly. Major McKinney's friends, 
instead of hanging him in effigy for his part in 
this disgraceful affair, honored him with a costly 
and imposing funeral. 

Colonel William Rogers, at the head of eighty 
men, all armed to the teeth, proceeded one day 
to storm an Indian rancheria— not a very difficult 
feat, considering that the only occupants of the 
place were a blind, helpless old squaw and four 
half-starved Indian dogs. The doughty heroes 
(?) did not hesitate an instant, but promptly 
killed them all, and later rode triumphantly into 
Kelsey, the bleeding scalp of the blind squaw 
decorating the Colonel's bridle. It was this 
brave deed which gave rise to the name, "Bill 
Rogers' Indian War." 

But our gallant soldiers once made the'mistake 
of attacking a village when the Indians were at 
home, and a desperate fight ensued, in which the 
bucks, contending with bow and arrow against 
the powder and ball of their enemies, were 
quickly slain; while the squaws were spared 
temporarily for their highly-civilized conquerors 
to amuse themselves with, then they were sub- 



46 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

iected to the same fate as their male partners 
had been. 

This "war," which accomplished nothing, cost 
the State of California three hundred thousand 
dollars, and many people have been so skeptical 
as to doubt that the whole of this sum went for 
military operations against the Indians, or in 
ministering to the wounded. 

Despite the prevalent ruffianism of those days, 
there was still much of chivalry exhibited by the 
average Californian, as the following incident 
attests: 

In the fall of 1860 a very pretty young woman, 
wife of a Placerville hotel-keeper, was frequent- 
ly seen riding a pony among the hills. On one 
occasion she encountered, upon the road a few 
miles from town, a crowd of roughs, one of 
whom insulted her. As soon as Mrs. Herrick 
reached the town and reported what had occurred, 
a mob of indignant citizens sallied forth, and be- 
fore many minutes had passed one end of a stout 
rope was around the culprit's neck and the other 
was thrown over the branch of a tree. Upon 
his promising faithfully that he would never 
again insult a woman in California, the man was 
allowed to depart. To the early pioneers there 
could be no worse crime than disrespect shown 
to a good woman. 

At this period of El Dorado's history despera- 
does from Texas and Missouri were numerous; 
there were many robberies committed, and fire- 
arms were frequently in use. Claim jumping 
was a common occurrence. Near Placerville a 
certain individual took possession of a claim 
owned by a young man who had gone to his 
cabin for lunch. The offender, a /gambler 'from 



MATHIAS LAUBER 47 

Missouri, wore, among other things, a white fur 
plug hat and a blue swallow-tail coat with brass 
buttons, while around his waist was a broad belt 
filled with revolvers and bowie knives. In a 
few minutes the owner of the claim appeared ac- 
companied by a large and strongly built man, 
one Marple of Philadelphia. The Philadelphian 
sauntered up carelessly and, accosting the Mis- 
sourian, requested him to leave. The fellow in- 
solently refused to stir, and as he spoke he 
placed his hand upon one of his numerous 
weapons. Without further parley, Mr. Marple 
stepped forward, collared the Missourian and as- 
sisted him out of the claim in no gentle manner; 
and the boaster, who like all of his kind, was a 
rank coward, slunk away. 

A desperado named Burns, who afterward 
helped to capture the notorious bandit, Joaquin 
Murieta, was in the habit of lounging around the 
various bar-rooms, carrying about his waist an 
arsenal in miniature. A dispute having one day 
arisen between this individual and the Mr. Mar- 
ple just described, Burns promptly grasped a re- 
volver, whereupon the Philadelphian, shoving 
a huge fist almost into the man's face, remarked, 

" Yes, draw your weapon, and I'll bet drinks 
for the crowd that I'll knock you down before 
you can cock it." 

Burns, evidently concluding that -discretion 
was the better part of valor, put up his weapon 
and treated the bystanders. 

Another border ruffian made his home at a way 
station or bar-room, on the emigrant road a few 
miles from Hangtown, or Placerville. This per- 
son had a habit of accosting miners and strangers 
who stopped at the place in a rude and barbarous 



48 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

manner. Drawing a weapon, he would ask the 
stranger if he had said his prayers ant was 
ready to die. Upon the stranger's offering to 
treat to whiskey, the ruffian would cease his 
threatening demonstrations. But the fellow tried 
his game of intimidation once too often. An old 
Kentuckian stood at the bar one day quietly en- 
joying his beverage, when the ruffian approached, 
clasping an immense bowie-knife, and inquired of 
the new-comer if he had said his prayers that 
morning. The old Kentuckian replied that he had 
not, as he had done all his praying in his younger 
days, and enough, he "reckoned", to last him the 
rest of his life; as he spoke, he drew his revolver 
and fired, the ball crashing through the despera- 
does' brain. No inquest was held, as the Coroner 
thought it unnecessary. 

Many were the rich strikes made in the gold 
mines during those early years in El Dorado coun- 
ty. On a warm and sultry day in the spring of 
1851 several prospectors were at work with their 
cradles in Emigrant Ravine, some two miles above 
Placerville. There appeared a stranger, with his 
pick and pan for prospecting, and inquired of the 
miners if there was a place where he could work. 

One of the men pointed to an oak tree upon 
a nearby knoll and remarked jokingly, 

"Yes, there by that tree is the finest place to 
work that I know of." 

The stranger viewed the ground, and taking the 
miner's joke for the truth, straightway fell to 
work. The soil was deep and the digging hard, 
but the stranger persevered, and after two days 
uncovered the bedrock eight or ten feet below 
the surface. From the bottom of this hole he 
cradled out more gold within a week than the 



SAMUEL KYBURZ. 49 

neighbors who had sought to fool him, a "tender- 
foot", had obtained in their whole season's work. 
This was but one of many instances proving the 
oft-repeated assertion that "gold is where you 
find it." 

A colored man, walking at the foot of a steep 
hill, picked up a small nugget of gold, whose 
edges were sharp and which apparently had 
never been in running water. But whence came 
it? That was the mystery. The negro, out of 
curiosity, dug a hole upon the hillside. He 
found no gravel. The soil upon the bedrock was 
a deep crimson color, and scattered through the 
red earth was an abundance of coarse gold, 
which had never been in contact with water, but 
had been deposited by heat or chemical action. 
This was the first discovery, in that neighbor- 
hood, of the valuable, red hill gold deposits. 

During the spring of 1860 four deserting sail- 
ors from San Francisco drifted up into the foot- 
hills of El Dorado county. They wandered about 
for a few days, and finally found themselves 
near the head of a small ravine, which opened 
into a deep canyon. The spot looked inviting, 
and one of the sailors remarked, 

"Well now, me lads, let's drop anchor here; 
pipe all hands, pass the grog and make the blarst- 
ed dirt fly." 

One of them began by measuring off a spot 
"about the size of the forehatch"; and he im- 
mediately commenced work with his pick and 
shovel, "To break out the cargo until he struck 
bottom," he said. 

Some miners working in the ravine below 
watched these operations, and were greatly 
amused to see the jolly tars hunting for gold at 



50 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

the top of a hill. The soil was not deep, and by 
taking turns at the work, they soon reached the 
bedrock, where they found dirt and gravel of a 
pretty red color. They took a panful down to the 
ravine, where one of the old miners offered to 
wash it, though he remarked that it was hardly 
necessary, for "gold could never have got away 
up there at the top of the hill," But to the as- 
tonishment of the miner and his partners, that 
one pan of gravel yielded about twenty dollars 
in gold. The sailors procured candles and the 
necessary tools and went to work. At the end of 
three months they had secured about $20,000 in 
gold. These diggings were located one-and-a- 
half miles from Hangtown, near the American 
river trail, and the ravine near them was after- 
ward known as "Sailor Boy's Ravine." 

■In the winter of 1853-4.' our pioneer, Mathias 
ILauber, wearied of camp life, decided to return 
to the old home in the East. He reached New 
York in March, 1854, after having twice crossed 
the equator. He married soon after this, and 
became anxious to go back to California, But 
;his wife could not be persuaded to live in the 
Far West, which she looked upon as a wild and 
degenerate country; so, like a loyal husband, 
Lauber remained in the East, where he worked 
faithfully to provide and maintain a home. Eight 
children were born to them. 

In 1863 Lauber enlisted in Company E of the 
16th New York Volunteer Cavalry, in which he 
served during the remainder of the Civil War. 

His wife died at Buffalo, New York, in 1873. 
The same year Lauber was again married, his 
new bride being a widow with three little sons. 
After his marriage Lauber moved with his family 



MATHIAS LAUBER. 51. 

to Kansas, where the second Mrs. Lauber died irv 
1892. Soon afterward Lauber returned to the 
Golden West which he had left so many years 
before. 

Of Lauber's children — five girls and three boys 
— all the sons and two daughters still are living. 
The sons are in Kansas; one daughter lives in 
Ontario, Canada, and the other, Mrs. M. Barker, 
is in Placerville, California, where the father also 
resides. 

In 1903 Lauber was injured by a fall in Los 
Angeles and consequently he walks by the aid' 
of crutches. But his memory still is vivid and 
nothing delights him more than to pass again in 
spirit through the perils, the hardships and tri- 
umphs of the golden days when California 
was young. 



III. 

SAMUEL KYBURZ, 

WHO LED A SUTTER EXPEDITION. 



To become, in the prime of manhood, a pioneer 
of a future commonwealth, and to live through 
half a century of that State's history, watching 
the gradual evolution from primitive conditions 
into organized industry, does not fall to the lot 
of every man. Yet the subject of this sketch 
realized such a destiny. 

Born in Switzerland on the twentieth day of 
June, 1810, Samuel Kyburz received as his birth- 
right that sturdiness of body and steadfastness 
of purpose which belong to mountaineers the 
world over. His early life was of the pastoral 
order so common among the Swiss people; but 



SAMUKL KYBURZ. 53 

in 1846 he embarked for new fields, coming 
with his friend, John A. Sutter, to California. 
When Captain Sutter established his fort and 
trading post in the Sacramento valley, Kyburz 
became his general superintendent and confiden- 
tial adviser, in which capacity he assisted Sutter 
for several years. 

In 1847 Captain Sutter, wishing to engage in 
the lumber business, sent out a number of small 
expeditions in search of a good timber and mill- 
ing locality. The most important of these par- 
ties was led by Samuel Kyburz, and consisted 
of a German mill-wright named Gingery and 
two or three Indians. They explored the Sierra 
Nevada foot-hills east of Sutter's fort, and in the 
course of their wanderings discovered the little 
valley in which Coloma now stands. Later, 
when James W. Marshall had selected the actual 
site for the erection of the saw-mill at Coloma, 
Samuel Kyburz induced Captain Sutter to choose 
that location instead of the one in Butte county 
which Marshall favored. And when the articles 
of partnership between Sutter and Marshal! 
were drawn up by Sutter's clerk, General John 
Bidwell, Kyburz was one of the witnesses to the 
transaction. 

During the early Fifties Samuel Kyburz fol- 
lowed the business of general merchandising in 
Sacramento and San Francisco; then moved up 
to Clarksville, in El Dorado county, where dur- 
ing the remaining years of his long life-time he 
pursued the uneventful but profitable occupation 
of farming and stock-raising. For several years 
he held the office of Justice of the Peace. 

The history of such an unobtrusive career, to 
be of general interest, must consist mainly of 



54 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

narratives of the more important contemporary 
events. 

Eight miles southeast of the scene of the gold 
discovery at Coloma was the settlement of "Dry 
Diggings", so named because the creek upon 
which it was named was practically dry in the 
summer. This camp had been discovered early 
in 1848 by William Daylor, one of Sutter's asso- 
ciates. The creek bed and the land adjacent to 
it were immensely rich, and Dry Diggings soon 
became a populous camp. On a certain night, 
about the middle of January, 1840, Lopez, a Mex- 
ican gambler who had in his possession a large 
sum of money, was attacked in his room in Dry 
Diggings by five men, overpowered and robbed. 
But while the crime was being committed, some- 
one raised the alarm and a number of miners con- 
stituted themselves a * Vigilance committee/ ' 
tried their prisoners, convicted them and sen- 
tenced each of the five men to receive thirty- 
nine lashes. The next day was set as the time 
of punishment. It being Sunday, throngs of 
people came from all directions to witness the 
much-talked-of flogging. 

An eye-witness, E. Gould Buffum, formerly a 
lieutenant in Stevenson's New York Volunteers 
and afterward editor of the "Alta-Californian," 
relates that when he arrived at the place he found 
a large crowd assembled around an oak tree, to 
which was lashed a man with a naked back, al- 
ready gashed and bleeding, but upon which an- 
other man was still applying with all his strength 
a long rawhide whip. A dozen men stood.;near, 
with loaded rifles aimed at the prisoner, and ready 
to fire should any attempt be made to escape. 
When all the culprits had been flogged for their 



SAMUEL KYBURZ. 5S 

attempt at robbery, other charges of robbery and 
attempted murder, committed the previous 
autumn on the Stanislaus river, were made 
against three of the men — two Frenchmen and a 
Chileno. The prisoners had been so severely 
punished that they were unable to stand and had 
to be removed to a place where they could lie 
down. Nevertheless, the assembled crowd, 
some two hundred men, coolly proceeded with a 
trial of the accused men upon the fresh charges — 
attempted robbery and murder. True, it did not 
appear that either crime had been consummated; 
but it was evident that these three personages 
were bad men, and the general sentiment was 
that, considering the fact that the community had 
no adequate protection against such evil-doers, 
they had best be put out of the way. According- 
ly, when the informal trial resulted in a verdict of 
"guilty" and when a member of this self-con- 
vened court moved that the prisoners be punished 
by hanging, the approbation was almost unanim- 
ous. 

At this juncture E. Gould Buffum, the eye- 
witness before mentioned, sprang upon a stump 
and in the name of God, humanity and law, vig- 
orously protested against such extreme measures* 
But the crowd, having reached a decision, and 
being also excited by strong drink, objected to be- 
ing criticized, and even threatened to hang the 
brave orator himself if he did not cease arraigning 
their conduct. So the speaker, seeing that all re- 
monstrance was useless, stepped down from his 
improvised rostrum, and resigned himself to wit- 
ness an outrage which he could not prevent. 
Only half an hour's notice of their impending fate 
was given the prisoners. At the conclusion of 



56 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

that time they were brought forward, still bleed- 
ing from their flogging; put upon a wagon, and 
held up while the ends of three ropes, which 
had been thrown over the branch of a tree, were 
fastened around their necks. All opportunity for 
explanation was denied them. They attempted 
to speak; but as they knew nothing of English, 
the words they used were understood by only a 
few persons. Vainly they called for an inter- 
preter. Amid their own outcries and the yells of 
the more brutal members of the mob, their arms 
were pinioned and a black handkerchief was 
bound tightly across the eyes of each; then, at a 
signal, the wagon was drawn from under them, 
and they were swung into eternity. Graves 
had meanwhile been dug, and as soon as all life 
had deserted them, the bodies were cut down and 
buried. Thus, owing to one of the most cowardly 
and dastardly deeds ever committed in the name 
fof justice, Dry Diggings acquired the name of 
"Hangtown." 

The oak tree upon which this and one or two sub- 
sequent executions took place stood on Main street 
near the northeast corner of Main and Coloma 
streets, and it became widely known as the "old 
hangtree." It has long since fallen before the ax of 
the woodman, and for years a business structure 
has covered the stump from the eyes of the cu- 
rious, until now only El Doradoans and their de- 
scendants know of its location. As a matter of 
history, the stump is under the rear end of the 
floor of the second store on Main street east of 
Coloma street, as attested by George C. Ranney, 
a well-known pioneer, who laid the floor of the 
building over the stump and who had often seen 
the "old hang tree" itself in other days. 



SAMUEL KYBURZ. 57 

In February, 1850, when the first statute di- 
viding the State into counties was passed, the 
Legislature changed the name of "Hangtown" to 
"Placerville" and provided that either it or Co- 
loma, according to the choice of the qualified 
voters at the first election for county judge, 
should be the seat of justice of El Dorado coun- 
ty, Coloma won, and by act of April 25, 1851, 
was declared the county-seat. But Placerville 
continued the fight, and after two other struggles, 
finally in 1857 won the victory and has ever 
since retained its pre-eminence in El Dorado 
county. 

In El Dorado county, as in all other portions of 
California during the earlier years, only the most 
primitive methods of mining were known. The 
most common of implements was the "pan", a 
dish usually made of sheet iron, with sloping 
sides five or six inches deep, and from twelve to 
eighteen inches in diameter. When filled with 
auriferous earth, it was held in the hands under 
water and shaken and rocked in such a manner 
as to wash the lighter earth over the edges, 
while the heavier particles, including the gold, 
sank to the bottom. If the earth contained nug- 
gets, they were picked out during the process 
of washing; but if the metal were in very small 
grains, it was collected at the end of the wash- 
ing in the shape of "gold-dust." When "pros- 
pecting," that is, hunting for new deposits or 
new mines, the pan was used to test the rich- 
ness of the earth examined. An experienced 
prospector could save nearly all the gold and 
foretell with remarkable accuracy how much a 
body of earth would yield. In the very early 
days, in extremely rich localities the pan was 



58 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO, 

frequently dispensed with and the gold picked 
out of crevices with knives or spoons. These 
crevices were usually among the rocks in the 
bed of a stream or ravine, over which mountain 
torrents had rushed for many winters and left 
their deposits of the precious metal. 

An improvement over the mining-pan was the 
rocker, or cradle, which Isaac Humphrey, a Geor- 
gia miner, had introduced a few weeks after the 
discovery of gold. The rocker was a wooden 
box or trough, somewhat like a child's cradle 
with the lower end left open. At the higher end, 
r near the top, was fixed the hopper, or sieve, 
usually made of a plate of sheet iion, or, if iron 
could not be obtained, a piece of raw- 
hide, perforated with holes about half 
an inch in diameter, was used. This 
hopper had sides of sufficient height to hold sev- 
eral shovelfuls of earth without spilling while 
being rocked from side to side; at the same time 
fit was low enough to allow stones to be picked 
out easily and thrown aside. Extending trans- 
versely across the floor of the rocker, about a 
foot apart, were nailed two or three little strips 
of wood, perhaps an inch in height, styled "bars" 
or "riffles," but more properly "cleats," one of 
them at the end or "tail," where the dirt was 
washed out. On the under side of the box was 
fastened a pair of rockers, resembling those of 
an infant's cradle, while nailed against the head 
on the outside was a perpendicular handle 
wherewith to rock the cradle. When in use, the 
rocker must be on a solid surface near the earth 
to be worked and the water necessary to wash it, 
and with the head a little elevated above the tail. 
When one man worked it he would throw a few 



SAMUEL KYBURZ. 59 

shovelfuls of gold-bearing earth Into the hopper; 
then, seizing the handle with one hand and at 
the same time dipping and pouring water on it 
with the other, he rocked until all the dirt and 
gravel, except the larger stones, were washed 
through the sieve; after this more shovelfuls 
of earth were thrown in and the same process 
repeated, the larger stones, as they accumulated, 
being of course from time to time thrown out. 
If several persons worked a rocker in partner- 
ship, as was usually the case, naturally the di- 
vision of labor and the consequent speed at- 
tained brought more profitable returns than if 
each man worked separately. 

As mining operations became more extensive 
and it was important to reach large quantities of 
earth in a brief period of time, a more capacious 
and rapid washer than the rocker was needed; 
so the "long-torn" and the "sluice" were used. 
The long-torn was a shallow trough of boards at 
least fifteen feet long by as many inches wide, 
and usually increasing in width toward the end, 
through which a continuous stream of water was 
conducted. A miner, standing beside this trough, 
would at intervals throw into it quantities of 
earth, which were carried by the current to a 
sieve at the lower end, usually called the "riddle". 
Here another man stood with a shovel or pitch- 
fork and threw out the boulders, rocks and 
stones, while the fine gravel and sand, including 
scales and grains of gold, were carried through 
and fell, in many small streams, into a shallow 
box, with an open lower end, which had cleats 
nailed to the bottom like the cradle. As the con- 
tents of the box, which was placed just below 
the riddle, were kept in constant agitation by the 



60 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

numerous streams pouring into it, the gold 
worked to the bottom and was caught and saved 
by the cleats or by the quicksilver usually de- 
posited there for the purpose of catching the very 
fine dust, while the gravel, sand and mud were 
floated and carried off by the escaping water. 

The sluice was also a wooden trough, some- 
what resembling the long-torn, though often several 
feet and even twenty feet wide, with cleats and 
usually quicksilver at various points along it, hav- 
ing a continuous stream running through and 
being of sufficient length and inclination to wash 
thoroughly all the earth thrown in before it 
reached the lower end or tail. In the improved 
sluice, at a certain point there was a grate of par- 
allel iron bars, called a "grizzly," that allowed 
the fine particles to pass down but stopped the 
boulders and cobbles, which were thrown out as 
at the riddle of the long-torn. Often there was 
a series of sluice boxes, one below the other; 
and it was not unusual to see two sluice boxes 
side by side, the advantage of which was that 
while the gold or amalgam was being removed, or 
"cleaned up", from one, the sluice stream might 
be turned into and continue to flow without in- 
terruption through the other. 

Without a constant stream of water near, nei- 
ther the long-torn nor the sluice could be used. 
There were various methods of securing such a 
stream; throwing a dam across the bed of a riv- 
er, digging a canal around a fall, or by the use of 
any kind of acqueduct bringing water from a 
higher level. But the most common way, and a 
method which is still a characteristic of Califor- 
nia river mining, was by means of a water-lifting 
wheel. At nearly every point along these rivers, 



SAMUEL KYBURZ. 61 

where extensive operations were carried on, im- 
mense wheels consisting of shafts, arms and 
cross-boards and resembling the paddle-wheels 
of a steamboat, immersed just deep enough to be 
driven by the current, extended across the stream 
and revolved noisily but steadily. Attached to 
each wheel, and worked by it was a contrivance 
for lifting water, usually a series of buckets on a 
belt, or a chain with valves running through a 
trough, or a pump of large capacity; and every 
one of these contrivances supplied a long-torn 
and sometimes a sluice hundreds of feet long. 

Of course, among the inventive American min- 
ers, various other mining contrivances, more or 
less practical, were tried; but in those early days 
the pan, the rocker and the sluice were used by 
the majority of Californians. 

It was not until 1852 that hydraulic mining, by 
means of which entire hillsides and mountains 
were washed away, was invented. First the 
canvas hose was used for this purpose. In after 
years the hose was supplanted by iron pipe and a 
long and heavy iron nozzle, styled a "giant," 
such as we see in use to-day. Iron could stand 
such a great pressure of water that it was prefer- 
able to any other material for such a purpose. 

When quartz-mining was begun, the hand mor- 
tar, the old-style arastra and the Chile mill were 
first utilized. These gave gave way later to the 
stamp mill and the various rotary mills now in 
use. 

Many immigrants who entered California 
shortly after Marshall's discovery seemed to 
think that gold was to be found on the surface 
of the ground, whence it could be very easily 
scraped up and cleaned from the dirt. Upon one 



62 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

occasion a new-comer pulled up his team along- 
side a spot where several prospectors were busy 
and after watching them silently for a few mo- 
ments, enquired, 

"Wall, now, and is that the way you fellers 
hes to do to git the derned stuff?" 

Receiving an affirmative answer, he remarked 
in disgust, 

"Yas? Wall, then, I don't keer for none in 
mine. Gee haw, buck, jest go lang thar!" 

Every trade and profession was represented 
among the gold-seekers of early California. A 
contemporary of Samuel Kyburz describes an 
amusing scene. 

At one place he found a lawyer, with gold 
spectacles and kid gloves on, hard at work in the 
mud and water. Near him was a physician 
with a plug hat and with his trousers tucked in 
his boots. Upon a slight elevation two well- 
dressed men were working. They were law- 
yers from New York City and were known 
among their companions as the "dandy miners". 
In several months of mining it is said that 
they cleared a moderate fortune. 

After those first eventful years Samuel Kyburz 
was an observer of, rather than a participant in, 
the stirring scenes of the youthful common- 
wealth. Busied with the cares of a growing 
family and the management of his increasing 
and profitable farming and stock-raising bus- 
iness, he had little time or inclination to mingle 
with the outside world. 

The years passed on. Children grew up and 
married, and in the swift march of time our 
friend saw rosy grandchildren taking their places 
and hurrying toward maturity, 



SAMUEL KYBURZ. 63 

And then came the end. On the 15th day of 
January, 1898, Samuel Kyburz, oldest of El Do- 
rado's leading pioneers, heard and answered the 
call from beyond another Golden Gate, far greater 
than the one toward which he had traveled more 
than half a century before. 



IV. 
WILLIAM B. HOUSE, 

AROUND THE HORN IN '49. 



When that vast Westward movement began 
during the months immediately following the 
discovery at Coloma, no portion of the United 
States was more disturbed than was staid old Puri- 
tan New England; and of all the commonwealths of 
that sober sisterhood none exhibited greater agi- 
tation than did orthodox Connecticut of Blue 
Laws fame. 

It was during the month of December, 1848, 
that an organization styled "The Hartford Union 
Mining and Trading Company' ' was started in 
Hartford for the purpose, set forth in that com- 



WILLIAM B. HOUSE. 65 

pany's "Article of Association": 

"We, the subscribers, for the purpose of trad- 
ing and transacting other lawful business in the 
Town of Hartford, State of Connecticut, and of 
mining, trading, purchase and sale of real estate, 
navigation, commerce, building and manufacture 
in California in the United States of America, do 
hereby associate in conformity with the Act en- 
titled 'An Act relating to Joint Stock Corpora- 
tions ' as a joint stock company, and do engage 
to take and pay for the number of shares set to 
our respective names/ 7 

The Company's minutes continue in these 
words: 

"A series of By-Laws were then presented 
and passed after which the following gentle- 
men were elected officers: 

"Directors:— A. M. Collins, Noadiah Case, Hoyt 
Freeman, Ezra Clark and Charles T. Webster, 
The Directors are to remain in Hartford county. 

"Managers: — Leonard H. Bacon, Hezekiah 
Griswold, Lorenzo Hamilton, Emerson Moody, 
Franklin Bolles, Erastus Granger and Jared W. 
Smith. The Managers are to go out with the 
expedition. Mr. Griswold and Mr Granger have 
since resigned. Feb. 5. The vacancy caused by 
the resignation of Mr. Granger, was filled by the 
choice of Captain David P. Vail 

"Officers of the Ship:— David P. Vail, of Sag 
Harbor, Captain. Henry T. Havens, of Sag Har- 
bor, 1st Mate. Henry C. Rich, of Manchester, 
2nd Mate." 

There were one hundred twenty-two mem- 
bers in the Company, and these, together with 
five employees of the vessel, and an additional 
passenger, the Rev. O. F. Parker, constituted the 



66 PIONEERS OF EL DuRADO. 

entire number of persons carried by the ship, 
"Henry Lee," on its voyage to California. 
Among the names of the Company we find those 
of "William B. House, Bootmaker," and "George 
C, Ranney, Joiner", both of them pioneers of nl 
Dorado county. 

William B. House first saw the light of day in 
New York State, near the border of Connecticut, 
on April 5, 1828, the family moving to Hartford, 
in the latter State, when William was only four 
years old. 

The elder House and his forbears for several 
generations back had supported themselves by 
paper-making. But William, when his school- 
ing was finished, learned the trade of boot-bot- 
tomer, in which business he was engaged when, 
a few months before his twenty-first birthday, 
he joined The Hartford Mining and Trading Com- 
pany. 

On the afternoon of February 17, 1849, the 
vessel, Henry Lee, with its load of hardy New 
Englanders, together with two years' provisions, 
the necessary mining implements and a large 
stock of general merchandise, sailed out of New 
York Harbor on its long voyage around Cape 
Horn. 

A member of the Company, Linville J. Hall, 
then a printer by trade, but afterward a clergy- 
man, set up and printed, on shipboard, during 
their journey, a complete account of the trip. 

Upon entering the Gulf Stream, our voyagers 
encountered a fierce gale accompanied by cold 
rains, a heavy sea and an occasional flurry of 
snow. At intervals during the first week out 
these disturbances prevailed, varied at times by 
severe squalls, often accompanied by lightning. 



WILLIAM B. HOUSE, 67 

In the forenoon of the first Sunday at sea there 
was a lull in the storm, and the clergyman, Rev. 
O. F. Parker, held devotional services upon the 
deck, first reading the Twelfth Psalm and then 
addressing his audience in words befitting the 
occasion. Singing of sacred hymns concluded 
the observances. 

The magnitude of the surroundings and the 
threatening of the elements combined to make 
the hour one of singular impressiveness. No 
stately cathedral echoed the songs and the 
words of praise; but overhead was the bound- 
less sky, now draped in somber grey, while 
roundabout, apparently wave after wave toward 
infinity, stretched the heaving Atlantic. Who 
can marvel that, amid such grandeur, our pilgrims 
felt that God Himself was near? 

In the afternoon a hard squall came up from 
the northeast, and early next morning part of the 
vessel's upper rigging was carried away by the 
wind. Gales and squalls alternated during the 
remainder of the day. 

Rev. L. J. Hall, the minister, — then a printer — 
who wrote and printed a narrative of the voy- 
age, writes of this period:- 

My sailor chum was full of song and spirit 
during the storm that was so depressing on 
others. He would go on deck in the darkest 
night and in the fiercest winds and cheer the 
lookout with his songs and stories. He had cut 
a hole through the partition between the fore- 
castle and the state-room that he might have the 
privilege of seeing, as well as conversing with 
the watch below. One night, after talking with 
some of the men in the forecastle, he suddenly 
turned to me and asked, 'Mr. Hall, if I should 



68 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

take a small lead pipe, place one end in the bung- 
hole of a barrel of water, or any other liquid,, 
and bend the other end down to reach a pail be- 
low the level of the bung-hole, would not all of 
the contents of the barrel run out, provided I 
exhausted the air in the pipe?' I replied that I 
had no doubt that a part of the contents would 
run out; at least he could make the trial. He 
drew a small quantity of lead pipe from a boot 
hanging in the corner of the state-room and 
passed it through the hole in the partition to the 
forecastle. The act and the question recalled a 
queer remark of the Captain about the unknown 
— or unregistered— barrel. A thought came and 
vanished. Each of the golden brotherhood had 
signed a solemn pledge of temperance which 
forbade any side speculations. There were to 
be no bloated stock-holders— all should be equal 
in interest and profits; one share to each man and 
no more. 

"The Captain to-day stopped suddenly and 
looked at the watch on deck, who were full of 
frolic; all did not keep their sea-legs well. One 
would dance a hornpipe or shuffle a break-down', 
yet with good nature endeavor to obey com- 
mands. His suspicions were aroused that all 
was not right. 'Breaking-out day' had just 
passed. This was a day when part of the 
watch went into the vessel to bring out such 
provisions as were wanted for the tables. An 
examination was made. The unknown barrel 
was discovered, with bung out and a lead pipe 
by its side. 'Good apple Jack', as the cider- 
brandy was called by the sailors, had been 
creeping up the pipe and down the throats of 
the crew. It was re-bunged, put into a hogs- 



WIILLAM B. HOUSE, 69 

head, headed up, and secured. Inquiries were 
made among the brotherhood, and the young 
men with the hope of saving the balance of the 
contents of the barrel, confessed that they had 
put it aboard — not knowing that it was a viola- 
tion of the compact — for a private speculation.'* 

For several days the inclement weather con- 
tinued. At times the vessel was plunging about 
wildly amid waves that often rose thirty feet in 
air. Then Old Ocean subsided temporarily, 
again the ship spread its billowing canvas, and 
the passengers, with the exception of the unfor- 
tunates who were sea-sick, began once more to 
take an interest in material joys. 

A few days later mild rains followed another 
change in the winds, but on Sunday, March 4 ? 
the second Sabbath from home, Nature was again 
smiling. Services were held, in which all par- 
ticipated. 

But the rest of this eventful voyage is best 
told by quotations from the most interesting por- 
tions of the Rev. L. J. Hall's valuable book,. 
"Around the Horn in '49." He says, in part: 

"Monday, March 5— Latitude 33 deg., 25 min.; 
Longitude* 49 deg., 46 sec. The wind changed 
from southeast to northwest in the latter part of 
the day; the barometer standing at 29.5 in. The 
day was comparatively mild and the breeze gen- 
tle. For the first time our studding-sails were 
spread. We passed through considerable quan- 
tities of gulf-weed. A brig was seen near us in 
the morning, and black-fish, somewhat larger 
than the porpoise, were playing around the 
ship. 

"To-day, we suppose, General Taylor was in- 
ducted into the President's seat. Though not at 



70 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

Washington, nor waiting the telegraph bearing 
the message, we were not forgetful of the 
day, the evening of which was celebrated by a 
'grand' inauguration dance upon deck, perhaps 
without the brilliancy of that at the Capitol; yet 
we doubt whether the hearts there were more 
merry, or limbs more light. In the early part of 
the evening two sets of dancers were called out 
upon the quarter-deck, and one around the fore- 
castle. There was music for all. The seamen 
afterwards came aft and joined the parties there. 
The moon was nearly full, The actors appeared 
to enjoy the night; the enjoyment of these was 
sufficient to please the mere lookers-on. This, 
together with the music and the pleasant eve fol- 
lowing so many unpleasant ones, gave new life to 
us all. ''Old Zack' had cheers all unheard, ex- 
cept by us. 

"Tuesday, March 6.— Latitude, 33 deg., 20 sec,; 
Longitude, 48 deg., 50 sec. Wind, early in the 
day, northwest; at night, southwest. Barometer, 
29.4 inches. There was rain in the morning and 
almost a calm ; a fine breeze afterwards, with the 
usual gale, when the ship careening to the wind 
dashed foaming along its dark course like a well- 
fed racer broken loose. We remained upon the 
deck till nearly midnight, watching the sea, spark- 
ling with phosphorescence — which had been ob- 
servable the evening before — and taking pleasure 
from the beauty of the scene. The brightness 
and life of the night before had given us joy; the 
darkness and loneliness of this afforded us no less 
satisfaction. We felt 

" ' There is society where none intrudes, 
By the deep sea, and music in its roar/ 

"As a means of passing time pleasantly, and 



WILLIAM B. HOUSE. 71 

for the improvement afforded by the exercise, 
many members had expressed a wish of forming 
a debating society on board. Accordingly, the 
'Henry Lee Debating Club' was organized. E. 
Moody was made President, G. G. Webster, 
Vice-President, and G. H. Fisher, Secretary; and 
a few simple rules adopted for the regulation of 
the members, Friday, whenever practicable, 
was the day fixed for the meetings of the club/' 

On Saturday, March 10, signs of an approach- 
ing storm were visible. The Captain stated that 
the rough weather they had experienced was very 
unusual in those latitudes at that time of the year. 
The following night— Sunday— a terrific storm 
burst upon the ship and continued throughout the 
night. 

Daylight showed that three feet of the fore- 
mast's head had snapped off in the gale, and the 
rigging and sails were badly damaged. But our 
friends were thankful for their own safety. Fur- 
thermore, the sails and rigging could also be 
saved. The injury had been great, but it was 
not irreparable. 

Weeks passed, however, before the necessary 
repairs could be brought to completion. Other 
ships were sighted, but only one came within 
speaking distance. But the storm had spent it- 
self, and for some time the vessel sped onward 
beneath smiling skies. 

In the tropics warm showers were encountered, 
but there were no gales or other disturbances of 
a serious nature. Our pilgrims crossed the equa- 
tor on the evening of March 31. On the 21st day 
of April the * 'Henry Lee" entered the harbor of 
Rio Janeiro, the capital of Brazil. In this city 
they found New York papers, the first news they 



72 PIONEERS OF EL DURADO. 

had obtained from home since the beginning of 
the voyage. The company and the crew spent 
several days enjoying the strange sights of the 
Brazilian metropolis. Only one unpleasant fea- 
ture marred the happiness of that brief sojourn. 
A sailor disobeyed orders and even ventured to 
attack the Captain, whereupon, as the case had 
to be taken before the American Consul, the man 
was left behind, it being time for our voyagers to 
put to sea again. 

Sunday, May 20, finds them nearingthe dread- 
ed Cape Horn, and for Friday, June 1, we quote 
the following: 

"Latitude, 53 deg.,10 min.; Longitude, 58 deg., 
40 min. In the last thirty-six hours we have 
-encountered, and — thanks to Him who holds the 
winds and waves in His hand — have come forth 
.unharmed from the most violent gales we ever 
:saw, or wish to see again. They came from the 
'Old quarter — southwest— and we verily believe 
from the very centre of the great storehouse of 
Australis itself, The storm first broke upon us 
Wednesday evening about 8 o'clock. The Cap- 
tain was at his post calmly awaiting the onset; 
and, at the right moment, and in a stentorian 
voice — suiting the action to the word-- ordered 
the sheets, one after another, to be let go and 
furled, and the ship put in storm dress for the 
night. In a few more moments everything was 
snug. We looked upon these rapid evolutions, 
both alow and aloft, and out upon the fretful 
elements which had caused them, with deep awe 
and solemn silence. The number, we believe, 
was small among us who did not feel consider- 
able solicitude as to the result of an encounter 
like this, greeting us, as it did, with a deafening 



WIILLAM B. HOUSE, 73 

roar, and heralded, as it had been, by a remark- 
able depression of the barometer. The mercury, 
when at the lowest, stood 21 8-10 inches. Dur- 
ing the whole of this storm the weather was cold, 
the thermometer at about 32 deg., or freezing 
point. But happily we have weathered its fury 
without suffering the loss of life or property/' * 

But the treacherous waters in the vicinity of 
the Cape were passed in safety, though the 
stanch little vessel weathered nearly a month of 
rough winds, storms and heavy seas. Under 
date of Sunday, June 24, Rev. L J. Hall quotes 
from Captain David P. Vail's journal; 

"I feel as if it would be right to congratulate 
ourselves on being safe round Cape Horn, which 
sometimes appeared almost out of the bounds of 
probabilities. At any rate, I am convinced that a 
ship may make her way round in the winter by 
exercising a great deal of patience. I would also 
recommend standing well out south as long as a 
ship makes no easting — say as far as 59 deg.; for 
I found near the land a strong northeast current 
which prevented our making westing when 
steering anywhere to the north of northwest. 

•'Many say winter is the best time to double 
the Cape; but, as far as my knowledge extends, 
give me. summer. In the first place you have 
long days; in winter the reverse — and nights 
eighteen hours long, with no moon, are not com- 
fortable. Then it is not cold in the summer. 
* * Never again will you catch me doubling 
Cape Horn from the eastward in the winter 
time," 

Fourth of July, 1849, dawned upon a sunny, 
rippling sea, and the day was fittingly observed 
on shipboard with true New England fervor. 



74 PIONEERS OF ED DORADO. 

At last, on Monday, September 10, there ap- 
peared, distance-faint, the world-renowned Gold- 
en Gate, or "Chrysopyle," so named by Colonel 
Fremont in his belief that San Francisco, because 
of its location, was destined to become the great 
centre of trade between Asia and America. The 
term "Golden" was suggested by the glow cast 
upon the waters by the beams of the setting 
sun. 

Three days later the "Henry Lee'' sailed into 
San Francisco Bay, and our pilgrims felt, as all 
must feel who enter that matchless harbor, some- 
thing of that mysterious enchantment, which 
gives San Francisco a fascination unique among 
the world's capitals. 

The ship's anchor having been dropped, Cap- 
tain Vail, turning to the happy passengers, lift- 
ed his hat and said, 

"Gentlemen, I have done my best for you." 

The heartfelt cheers of gratitude which greet- 
ed this remark answered him better than any 
words could have done. The Captain was visi- 
bly affected by this outburst of approval, and 
two tears rolled involuntarily over his sea- 
browned cheeks. 

After a few days spent in San Francisco, the 
Company divided itself into squads and started 
for the mining regions. On the way several men 
died of fever and dysentery. 

Early in the fall of 1849, our pioneers, William 
B. House and George C. Ranney, and other mem- 
bers of the Company, arrived in Placerville, then 
Hangtown. Like the majority of the early immi- 
grants, they first tried mining with varying suc- 
cess. House also worked at his trade of boot- 
bottoming. During his mining experience he 




H 
1 

o 

H 

5 



W 






WIILDAM B. HOUSE, 75 

claims to have taken out the largest single pan of 
gold which was ever found in Kohn Hollow — 
now Coon Hollow. The pan in question yielded 
$500, and House's entire day's work brought him 
$1070, out of which he paid 25 cents a sack to 
have the gold carried to Weber creek, where it 
could be washed. 

A year or two after our friends' arrival at the 
mines there occurred one of those brutal lynchings 
from which the little village had already derived 
its grewsome title, "Hangtown." 

A young gambler known as "Irish Dick" was 
one day dealing "monte" at a table in the 
"El Dorado Saloon," when a sudden altercation 
arose between two men at a near-by table. "Irish 
Dick," although not a party to the quarrel, im- 
mediately sprang up, drawing a bowie-knife, and 
rushing over to the disputants, coolly stabbed 
one of the men three times in rapid succession. 
Returning to his game, as quietly as if nothing 
had happened, he remarked to his partner, 
"I stabbed a man back there; am sorry for it." 
Friends urged him to flee and save himself, but 
he refused to heed their counsel. He was arrest- 
ed the next morning,*tried before Justice Hum- 
phreys at the corner of Main and Coloma streets, 
and found guilty of murder. The most of the in- 
habitants of the camp seemed willing to let the 
law take its course, but the brother of the victim 
could not be pacified. Jumping up, he cried ex- 
citedly, 

"He killed my brother! He must die!" 

His words fired the crowd and turned them 

into a lawless, unreasoning mob, eager to destroy. 

Seizing the prisoner, they hurried him to an oak 

tree close at hand, and in a few minutes all that 



76 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

was mortal of Irish Dick was dangling at a rope's 
end. 

There are several conflicting accounts of this 
affair. Some trustworthy " '49ers" assert that 
Irish Dick met his fate on the "old hang tree," on 
Main street, two doors east of Colorna street. 
Other pioneers, whose reputation for veracity is 
equally good, declare that, although the mob first 
intended to lynch their prisoner on that historic 
tree, they were dissuaded from their purpose by 
the proprietor of Merrick's Hotel, who feared that 
the excitement would jeopardize the life of a man 
who lay very ill in a room of the hotel ; so the 
mob proceeded up Coloma street and hanged 
their prisoner to the bough of another oak tree, 
which stood near the spot where the "Church of 
Our Savior" — Mr.Peirce's church — now stands. As 
there is no way of determining which is the true 
version, we can only conclude that someone's mem- 
ory is at fault and that each reader must take his 
choice of the two narratives. 

Shortly after the admission of California as a 
state, William B. House served on the Grand Jury 
at Coloma. It happened at this time that a man 
by the name of Doherty was on trial for horse- 
stealing. The jury in the case had been "out" 
two days and a night, but had failed to agree. 
While this trial was in progress, two other crimes 
were committed. A negro cook named Miller 
stole $5000 from one Martin, the owner of a 
boarding-house and grocery store in Kelsey; and 
an Englishman in the employ of a miner on 
Granite creek robbed his employer of $3000 in 
gold-dust. The stolen property was all recovered, 
but the cases were taken before the Grand Jury, 
who brought in bills of indictment against both 



WILLIAM B. HOUSE. 7? 

of the accused men. 

By this time, the people of the neighborhood, 
greatly displeased over the unaccountable delay of 
the jury in the Doherty case, began to gather 
near the court-house. County Judge Hall ad- 
dressed the crowd from the steps of the court- 
house, urging them to be patient. A prominent 
lawyer also talked to them in the same strain. 
The assemblage listened quietly to both speeches 
and then deliberately marched to the jail, which 
was located in one of Coloma's log-houses. 

In the meanwhile the Vigilance Committee of 
Placerville had been notified. Just as the Co- 
loma men reached the jail the Vigilance Commit- 
tee also appeared, mounted upon donkeys, mules 
and other steeds which they had taken posses- 
sion of along the road from Placerville. Benja- 
min F. Nickerson, auctioneer, and keeper of a 
saloon and gambling-hall, was riding ahead. 

Seeing the gathering throng, Harmon, an edi- 
tor, hurried to the jail, and ascending the steps, 
made an earnest plea that mercy be granted the 
unfortunate men. But the mob, putting him 
aside, rushed into the jail and came out with the 
negro, Miller. 

Miller had formerly implicated two other col- 
ored men, but he now confessed that he alone 
was guilty. He called for liquor, and someone 
brought him a half-bottle, which he quickly 
drained. Then Martin, the Kelsey landlord, said 
to his wayward cook, 

"Why did you steal from me? Didn't I al- 
ways treat you well?" 

"Yes, massa," the negro replied, "You's always 
treated me well; but when I stole I expected to 
get away; if caught, I expected to be hung." 



78 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

Without more ado the mob hurried the prison- 
er to an oak tree near the jail. He again asked 
for liquor, which was given him; and he had no 
sooner disposed of the stimulant than a rope was 
placed about his neck, and in a few minutes all 
was over. The crowd rushed back to the jail 
and brought out the Englishman who had stolen 
the gold-dust. The poor fellow begged piteous- 
ly for mercy. 

"I can't die! I ain't fit to die!" he cried. 

But the mob, apparently bereft of all sense of 
justice and humanity, dragged the suppliant to 
the oak tree, where they quickly disposed of 
him, thus in one brief hour adding two more 
atrocious crimes to the long list of outrages in 
El Dorado county which had been perpetrated in 
the name of equity. 

The mob, their appetite for murder still un- 
satisfied, next went to the court-house and told 
the sheriff that they would allow the jury fifteen 
minutes in which to bring in a verdict in the 
Doherty case, and that if a verdict were not 
forthcoming within the prescribed time they 
would first lynch the prisoner and then the jury. 
It is hardly necessary to add that a verdict of 
"guilty" was rendered without delay. 

In May, 1863, William B. House was married 
to Miss Mary E, Parlow, of New Bedford, Massa- 
chusetts, who had come to California via Cape 
Horn in 1853, and who was the first school-mis- 
tress in Placerville, where she opened school in a. 
log cabin April 1, 1853. The girl who later be- 
came the wife of Congressman Page was one of 
her first pupils; George F. Mack, afterward Sup- 
erintendent of Schools of Amador county, was 
another. 



WILLIAM B. HOUSE. 7* 

House was ill of typhoid fever and made his 
first appearance in Placerville riding behind an 
ox-team, and had been nursed back to health by 
Doctor A. Clark, then of the firm of Harvey and 
Clark, and since a prominent physician in the 
Insane Asylum at Stockton, But until recent 
years our pioneer's life has been signally free 
from bodily ailments. 

His last mining was done at Spanish Hill, in 
1873, when he had his leg broken by a cave. 
On October 20, 1896, while engaged in carpenter 
work in Placerville, he fell from a building, break- 
ing his hip, and, with the exception of light 
chores at home, he has since been unable to 
work. 

Frail in body, yet serene and happy in each 
other's companionship, William B. House and his 
wife still are here, loved and respected by all 
who truly know them, and sustained in their 
declining years by the consciousness of having 
achieved the greatest of earthly triumphs— a 
complete manhood or womanhood. 



ALEXANDER CONNELL, 



OF THE FAMOUS MAMALUKE HILL, 



The Georgetown Divide has never achieved 
the degree of notoriety that has been attained 
by other portions of El Dorado county, for its 
history has been a comparatively quiet one 
With one notable exception, it has experienced 
none of those arbitrary acts of lawlessness 
which gave Dry Diggings the sobriquet of 
"Hangtown." But the little "North Side" vil- 
lage and its environs, though lacking in that 
"respectable citizen" type of criminals, the 
lynchers, enjoy a merited distinction in the 
most profitable industry of the Sierra Nevada 



ALEXANDER CONNELD 81 

foothills; the "divide" of which Georgetown is 
the centre has produced large amounts of gold 
continuously for a longer period of time than has 
any other section of El Dorado county. But 
the underground treasures unlocked by George- 
town's pioneers have long since passed into the 
hands of a younger generation, until, today only 
one old "Forty-Niner" still remains on the orig- 
inal camping-ground, 

Alexander Connell was born near Ogdensburg, 
New York, on the 29th day of October, 1829, and 
started across the continent toward the Pacific 
Slope, February 20, 1849, The party of emigrants 
organized at Racine, Wisconsin, a train of five 
wagons being necessary to carry themselves and 
their effects. During the early part of the jour- 
ney, banks of snow impeded their progress 
They crossed the Missouri river five miles above 
the town of St. Joseph, Missouri. After reach- 
ing Utah, they followed the "old Mormon trail" 
across the plains, deviating; from that once near 
Salt Lake City. Coming to the Humboldt river 
in Nevada, they followed that stream to its mouth 
in Carson valley, and from there took the "old 
emigrant road" into El Dorado county, California, 
reaching Coloma August 25, 1849. 

Two days later Connell moved to Georgetown 
and shortly afterward began mining at Ford's 
Bar. He spent the winter at Spanish Dry Dig- 
gings, where he also engaged in prospecting. 
April, 1850, found him at Oregon Hill, in the 
neighborhood of Georgetown. And about this 
time occurred the tragedy which gave "Devine 
Gulch" its name. 

Devine, a miner, was at work a mile north of 
Georgetown, in a gulch sloping into Oregon 



82 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

Canyon. The place was uncommonly rich, pro- 
ducing much coarse gold, including a number of 
very large nuggets, one of which was sold for 
$900. But Devine, like a great many of his con- 
temporaries, had a passion for gambling, and his 
large earnings were quickly dissipated. 

On different occasions Devine had given his 
wife a number of large nuggets for safe keeping 
Having lost heavily at the gaming table one day, 
he sought to drown his sorrows in liquor, and re- 
turning to his cabin in an intoxicated condition, 
he called to his wife, who was in another room, 
and ordered her to bring him one of the nuggets. 
She refused; whereupon her husband, drawing 
a revolver, sent a bullet through the closed door, 
inflicting a mortal wound. 

A few minutes later, when a mob of indignant 
citizens broke into the house and seized the 
murderer, his dying wife pleaded with her last 
breath for the life of her worthless spouse. Out 
of pity for her grief, the crowd spared the life of 
the miscreant until the woman's eyes had closed 
in death; then, taking their prisoner to an oak 
tree on the Wentworth place, they hanged him 
without further parley. 

Devine Gulch continued to yield large quanti- 
ties of the precious metal. During 1852 Nathan- 
iel and Sylvanus Bryant, while mining in the 
gulch, took out three nuggets, valued respectively 
at $525, $200 and $150, besides several other 
pieces ranging in value from $50 to $100. 

A few years later, Devine Gulch having been 
abandoned, Elisha Holmes settled there and 
acquired possessory title to practically all *of the 
property, It has since remained in the posses- 
sion of the Holmes family. 



ALEXANDER COWNELL. 83 

In 1841, more than forty years after the first 
nugget was discovered by Devine, the land in- 
cluding }he gulch was being worked as a farm by 
the present owner, E. B. Gitchel, a grandson of 
Elisha Holmes. In proximity to the gulch was a 
reservoir which had been used for mining pur- 
poses, and it occurred to Gitchel that if he should 
fill the reservoir with earth it would be an excel- 
lent garden-spot, with a much deeper soil than is 
ordinarily found upon hillsides. Imbued with 
that idea, on New Year's Day, 1891, he began to 
"sluice down" from the adjoining slope. About 
4 o'clock in the afternoon he found the largest 
nugget the gulch has produced, a piece valued at 
$1058.25. By night he had secured enough gold 
to fill a one-pound baking powder can, an amount 
exceeding $1500 in value. He had unknowingly 
come upon what had formerly been a curve of 
Devine Gulch, which had, by some upheaval of 
nature, been gradually filled "up, the waters of 
the stream having opened up h new channel, 
which again joined the gulch a little lower 
down. 

In 1862 Alexander Connell mined on Mama- 
luke Hill, his present home, and at one time a 
well-known mining camp. The hill has been 
immensely rich. In 1854, one panful of gold 
was prospected, yielding $2100. The same year, 
Klipstein & Keyser, proprietors of the "Clipside" 
claim, "sluiced out" $11,000 in one day. 

Connell returned to New York in 1857, where 
he entered the milling business and lost every- 
thing in the great financial panic. The next year 
he was again in California. But he was still 
unsettled, and the three years from 1865 to 1868, 
inclusive, he spent at dairying in New Hamp- 



84 PIONEERS OF EL DuRADO. 

shire. In 1868 he again turned toward the 
"Golden State," and there he still remains. 

On Sunday, July 23, 1854, a most brutal crime 
was perpetrated in Greenwood valley, near the 
present Georgetown and Auburn stage-road. 
An old man named William Shay was engaged 
in watering his garden when one Samuel Allen 
approached, knocked Shay down and stamped 
him to death, then, by use of large stones, liter- 
ally reduced the victim's head to a pulp. Allen 
attempted to escape, but he was arrested by an 
eye-witness of the crime and taken before Judge 
Stoddard, who ordered him to jail to await his 
trial. An officer who started for Coloma with 
the prisoner in his charge, was overtaken and 
overpowered by an angry crowd of men, who 
forcibly took possession of Allen, and. hurrying 
him to Greenwood, hanged him to the limb of an 
oak tree. This selfsame tree had previously 
served as a gallows for another criminal, James 
Graham of Baltimore, who, in 1851, had invited 
an old resident of Greenwood valley, a Mr. Les- 
ly, to go with him on a prospecting tour, and 
after getting the old man a safe distance from the 
settlement, shot him. Then, imagining his vic- 
tim to be dead, he turned and fled. But Lesiy, 
though mortally wounded, succeeded in crawl- 
ing to the cabin of John Burch, close at hand, 
where he related what had happened. The 
alarm was given, and a party of citizens pursued 
the murderer, caught him at Uniontown— now 
Lotus— and brought him back to Greenwood 
where he was tried by a jury of twelve men, 
condemned, and hanged. 

Despite its gruesome features, the life of the ear- 
ly Californian abounded in episodes which strong- 



ALEXANDER COwNKLL. 85 

ly appealed to the humorous side of his nature. C. 
W. Haskins, author of 'The Argonauts of Cali- 
fornia/' tells of a family he met on a road in El 
Dorado county, on their way Eastward. An 
inquiry as to their destination elicited this reply: 

"Wall, stranger, me an' the ole woman air a- 
gwine away from hyar. We air on the home- 
stretch to ole (Vlissoury agin, whar we cum frum 
nigh on ter ten year ago." 

He explained'that many years before he and 
his wife had become desirous of living in some 
secluded place where, he said, "We cud jest 
enj'y oursels, an' raise lots a' chickens without 
interferin' with nobody." 

Accordingly they had moved West and made 
their home upon the frontier. 

"Wall, stranger, that wuz a rale quiet place out 
thar for a spell, but jest as soon as they diskivered 
gold out in Californy, the jig were up, fer all 
them chaps who was agoin' thar, cum right along 
my way, an' jest shoved that air frontier of ourn 
right along ahead o' 'em t'ards the West. So 
one mornin' Nancy sez to me, sez she, 'Hiram, 
Hiram ! ef we air a-gwine to enj'y a solitude along 
with a frontier we mus' git away from hyer, 
t'ards the west, and get a leetle ahead of all them 
fellers.' 'Thet's so,' Nancy, sez 1, 'an' ef you 
pack up ther duds, I'll call ther chickens, hitch 
up ther team an' load ther wagon, and we'll git 
ahead on 'em and diskiver another frontier some- 
whar.' But durn my buttons, stranger, we've 
been tryin' to git a leetle ahead on 'em ever sence. 
But 'taint no use. We thot we had struck a 
frontier in Californy agin' fur sartin, when we 
fust got thar; but one mornin' arter we hed hed 
a long wet spell, the first thing I seen was a 



86 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

steamboat right in ther back-yard. So, sez I, 
'Nancy, Nancy, hyer they air jest a-comin' agin.' 
So we loaded our traps in the wagon and went 
over the mountain whar the ocean is, and we jest 
thought we hed got it now fur shure ; fur hyer 
wuz a sort of nat'ral frontier thet wouldn't stan' 
any pushin'. So we untied the chickens an' got 
ready, kind o' hum like, when one mornin' we 
heard the awf'lest n'ise, and w'en we went out 
durned if thar wern't a saw-mill right back of our 
chicken-house, an' they were just buildin' 'nother 
^one 'cross the crick, an' some ships wuz a-sailin' 
in frum ther ocean to load up ther lumber. Now, 
.Nancy never did like saw-mills. Sed she'd ruther 
hear it thunder, enny day, 'cause the sawin' n'ise 
sets her teeth on edge so. On'y she hain't got a 
natural tooth in her head, annyhow." 

"Well,'' inquired Haskins, "where did you go 
next?" 

"Wall," said the woman, "we thot we mought 
try it further north for a spell, so we moseyed 
'long up thru Oregon, and way off up into Idyho, 
where we foun' a frontier at last, fur sartin. An' 
I reckon 'twill stay there for a spell, too. We 
stayed on't a hull year, but had to git off on't 
agin on 'count of the chickens." 

Her auditor asked her to explain. 

"Oh, shucks," she replied, "a sawmill wuz 
nothin' t' the racket up thar, an' I'll tell you how 
it wuz. Yer see, in the winter 'tis tarnal cold, 
and ther roosters couldn't crow, for yer see jest as 
they 'gun to crow it all froze harder'n an icicle, 
so jest soon's spring's thaw cum on, why all ther 
crowin's thaf wuz fruz in ther winter 'gun to 
chirp, and such a crowin' time ye never heerd in 
all yer born days. And for more'n two weeks 



ALEXANDER CONNELL 87 

me nur Hiram didn't sleep a blessed wink. Wall, 
stranger, we jest packed up agin and thot we'd 
try the kintry, 'mong the cactuses in the sandy 
desert down in Aryzony. From the looks o* 
things down thar we thought mebbe we'd be 
'way frum'em all an' have the frontier all to our- 
selves, but we wuz hasty, though. One morn— 
in' Hi run, and sez he, 'Nancy, Nancy! 'taint no 
use! r They wuz comin' agin, sure 'nuff; fur 'way 
up the valley we cud see the dust a-risin', and 
we knowed whut that meant. An' now yer see, 
we air jest a-moseyin' back to ole Missoury 
agin." 

"Yaas,'' says Hiram, "the kintry's gittin' to 
be no 'count, and purty soon thar won't be a mite 
o' frontier lef\ fur they are jest a-crowdin' on it 
way down into Mex'co, an' 'twon't be very long 
'fore they'll be a-tryin' ter chuck it away up over 
inter Cahady. ter can't find enny solertude now 
anywhar." 

"Nary a solertude/' Nancy added, "Fur 'tis 
jest fizz! buzz! geerat! whang! slang! kerbang! all 
over the hull blessed Ikintry. Now we'll go 
back to ole Missoury agin, whar we kin git 
suthin' fit ter eat, anyhow, and we'll try to stub 
thru ther rest of our days 'thout enny frontier 
in our'n." 

Haskins asked if she could find nothing in 
California fit to eat. 

"Oh, yaas, sech as 'tis; but nothin' ter whut 
we can git in Missoury." 

"What can you get to eat there that is so much 
better than anything to be found in California?" 
queried Haskins. 

" Wall, stranger." she said pityingly, "yer 
never et poke-greens and bacon, down in Mis- 



PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

soury , fur ef yer hed yer never would a-ax'd sich 
a question." 

Haskins turned to the old man and asked for 
his opinion of California. 

' 'Wall," he replied, "'tis a big kintry, and I 
tell yer 'twon't be very long before there'll be a 
powerful heap er folks a-livin' all over, thicker'n 
rats in Sacramenty City" — "Yaas, or flees in San 
Frixo," interposed Nancy — "but when yer cum to 
talk about yer climate, there ain't none t' com- 
pare with climate in ole Missoury. W'y, jest 
think on't, stranger; ten an' 'leven months o' sun- 
shine in Californy an' no show for a pore man to 
git a minit's rest, and every mornin' 'long 'bout 
daylight yer jest hear the ole gal a-chirpin', 'Cum, 
cum, Hi, git up thar! the sun's a-risin' clare, and 
yer got a heap er work ter do, yer know.' No, 
stranger, I couldn't stan' it; so well go back to 
ole Missoury, live on poke-greens 'n bacon, 'n 
hev a show wen it rains t' talk politics with ther 
boys outen ther corn crib, or take a nap with ole 
Boz in the chimney corner for a spell. It's so 
drefful cheerin' like in ole age." 

These people were but one type of the many 
diversified human beings who had come to the 
land which Alexander Connell had found a con- 
genial home. 

He has never married, and now, in his hearty 
old age, he spends his days in and near his cabin 
on Mamaluke Hill, fully content in the society of 
his dog and cat and the solace of his newspapers 
and his books. Yet his friends are many and he- 
has the sincere respect of all who know him. 



VI. 

REUBEN K. BERRY, 

THE FIRST ALCALDE OF SALMON FALLS, 



"San Francisco, Cal., Sept. 21, 1849. 
"My Dear Wife: 

I received your letters of March and May with 
one of Louisa's, and you can judge with what 
satisfaction I read them. After so long and te- 
dious a voyage, it was a happy day for me to 
hear that you are all well. I thought sometimes 
that 1 should never hear from you again ; but we 
arrived yesterday, safe and sound, and very fat 
and healthy. But, oh! if I could see you all, and 
romp on the floor with those children, it would 
be a great satisfaction. I have news from home 
as late as the 12th of June. * * We expect an 



90 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

other mail daily; then I shall look for more news 
from you. 

"Now about the gold. I got a share yesterday 
and took it to the best office ; traveled the streets 
all day; and such a sight I never beheld — such 
bustle and confusion, and display of gold-dust! 
It was astonishing. Every few rods I would 
meet one or more men with a bag of gold-dust. 
I cannot describe the scene — you can get it better 
in the papers. All I can say is that what you see 
in the papers is not exaggerated in the least. I 
must say it far exceeds my expectations. Men 
are arriving hourly from the diggings with their 
bags of gold. The diggings are from one hun- 
dred to three hundred miles from here. We start 
for there in two or three days; go as far as Sut- 
ter's Fort in a schooner, from there by land up 
the Sacramento river. We all feel confident of 
making our fortunes and getting back home a year 
from this fall. And if I am lucky and get rich, 
and get back home with my money, I think it 
will repay us for the unpleasant hours spent in 
our long separation. We will then enjoy our- 
selves enough to make it all up. Give yourself 
no uneasiness about me. We can write often. 
Give the girls good advice and have them be 
careful what company they keep. I think I can 
make enough to make us all well off, and help 
some of our friends. Take good care of your- 
selves and live as easy as you can. 

"I hear that cholera is raging in New York and 
at the Isthmus of Panama; but it is very health- 
ful both here and at the mines. ..w^ 

"The next letter that I write I suppose you 
will hear that my pockets are bursting with the 
heft of gold. 



REUBEN K. BERRY. 91 

"Believe me ever yours, " 



The writer of the foregoing letter requires little 
introduction. Every sentence reveals to us a 
kindly, sincere, conscientious man, devoted to 
his home and family. 

Born at Prattsville, Green county, New York, 
on the 19th day of August, 1813, Reuben Kelley 
Berry spent his early years on a farm. His father 
was the proprietor of a tannery and a stage-line. 
After his boyhood days were over, Reuben start- 
ed a livery stable, in which business he was en- 
gaged until 1849. 

In 1842 he was married to Miss Amanda Phelps, 
who was one of the eleven children of an inn- 
keeper and farmer of Delhi, Delaware county, 
New York. She was a woman of exemplary char- 
acter, and a sincere Christian. After her marriage, 
it is said that the hospitality of her home was ex- 
tended to all, and that no shelterless or hungry 
wanderer knocked at her door in vain. She and 
her sister, Miss Charlotte Augusta Phelps, were 
the first two white women in Salmon Falls, Cali- 
fornia, one of El Dorado county's earliest mining 
camps. Miss Charlotte Phelps was also the first 
school-teacher employed in the Salmon Falls 
school. In 1853 she was married to Edward T. 
Raun, a San Francisco architect. 

Six children were born to Reuben K. and 
Amanda Berry: Romain Phelps Berry, in New 
York, Sep. 30, 1843; Wellington P. Berry, in New 
York, Jan. 31, 1845; Roselia S. Berry, in New 
York, Oct. 31, 1848; Charles Elihu Berry, at Sal- 
mon Falls, Nov. 9, 1851; Edward Theodore Berry, 
Aug. 19, 1854; and Kate Adelaide Berry, Sep. 
19, 1858, at Salmon Falls. Romaine died at 



92 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

Prattsville, New York, Oct. 4, 1850, shortly be- 
fore his seventh birthday. Roselia, Charles and 
Kate died in infancy — Roselia at sea, April 6, 1851; 
Charles at Salmon Falls, Mar. 19, 1853; Kate at 
the same place, Sep. 9, 1859. Wellington P. 
Berry met his death by falling from a hayrick at 
Salmon Falls, Oct. 2, 1863. Edward Theodore 
Berry is the only surviving member of the fam- 
ily. 

It was January 26, 1849, that Reuben K. Berry, 
eager to try his luck in the newly-discovered 
gold-fields, embarked in the ship "Morrison" for 
San Francisco, leaving his family in New York 
until he should be able to provide them a home 
in the Far West. The voyagers rounded Cape 
Horn safely and arrived in San Francisco Bay 
September 20. After visiting Sacramento and 
Coloma, Berry resolved to settle at Salmon Falls* 
where he established a store and hotel and also 
engaged in freighting with ox-teams between 
Sacramento and the mines. In addition to these 
occupations he succeeded in growing large quan- 
tities of grain and vegetables for the market. 

In a short time Berry had become one of the 
most prosperous and influential citizens of that 
portion of El Dorado county. He had the honor 
of being the first Alcalde* of Salmon Falls, an 
office to which he was appointed in 1850. The 
following extracts from letters written to his 
wife during that year will give us some idea of 
hi? gains and expenditures: 

'i will tell you the prices I have sold at since 
fall. Pork, flour, sea-bread, rice, beans, coffee* 
sugar and cornmeal — all six dollars per pounds 



* Alcalde, a magistrate— similar to a justice of the peace — m 
Spanish or Spanish- American pueblo or town. 



REUBEN K. BERRY. 93 

Saleratus, candles and pepper — three dollars per 
pound. Molasses and pickles sell at six dollars 
per gallon, and vinegar at four dollars per gallon. 
The price of cheese per pound is $1.50; potatoes 
$1.00; and butter, $2.50. 

"Besides the store, I keep boarders; have had 
from seven to ten all winter at $21.00 a week. 
The chambermaid I pay $4.00 per day. 

"I run two teams on the road, that pay the 
best of all. I have made $600 in four days with 
one team. I pay Andrew Hull $8.00 per day to 
drive a team. 

"I have just commenced digging my potatoes. 
They are certainly fine. I shall have about 800 
bushels and will sell them for $15 and $16 per 
bushel; besides watermelons, cucumbers and bar- 
ley, which will sell at the same rate," 

The copy of a ball ticket, given below, and 
which was printed in 1866, shows that luxuries, 
as well as necessities, continued to be expensive 
for a good many years: 



A GRAND BALL 

for the 
Benefit of the Public School 
at Salmon Falls 
will be given at R. K. Berry's Hotel, 
On St. Valentine's Day, February 14th, 1866. 

COMMITTEE OF ARRANGEMENTS: 

Hon. J. S. Campbell, Irwin Pratt, a. H. Tullar, 

Geo. E. Crooks. 

INVITATION COMMITTEE: 

Thos. Orr, Sr., John Gaines, Wm. Buchan, Rube K. Berry, 
John L. Burt. 



94 PIONEERS OF EL DuRADO. 

FLOOR MANAGERS: 
A. T. Leachman W. L. Moore. 

Music by Bentle & Simpson's Band, 

Tickets, including supper, $4.00. 

A general invitation is extended to all, 



In October, 1850, Berry rented his entire bus- 
iness for a year, and, returning to New York, 
brought his family out to California, settling in 
Salmon Falls. 

This mining-camp, located on both sides of 
the South Fork of the American river, some ten 
miles above Folsom, derived its name from a 
water-fall in the river, close to the site of the 
town, whither the Indians from the mountains 
used to come for the purpose of catching salmon, 
with which the river abounded. 

Previous to this, in 1849, the place called "Hig- 
gins' Point," a short distance below Salmon Falls, 
had been the scene of a very rich gold discovery 
by one Higgins, a Mormon from Australia. When 
Berry and his party first arrived, they found 
only a Mormon settlement there. Such a state 
of affairs was not satisfactory to Berry, and early 
in the following year he took out a possessory 
claim of the land and had a town laid out and 
surveyed. The streets were arranged on the 
checker-board plan. Parallel with the river were 
Water, State, Government and Washington 
streets. Sacramento street was across Sweet- 
water creek, and those running at right angles to 
the river were named High, Polk, Taylor7 Clay, 
Brower and El Dorado streets. The town grew 
rapidly during the first few years, increasing from 
a population of 700 in 1820 to 2500 in 1868, after 



REUBEN K. BERRY. 9S 

which it began rapidly to decline. 

The early "diggings" in this neighborhood 
were immensely rich, Higgins 1 Point yielding 
some $200,000. Reuben K. Berry wrote to his 
wife on July 25, 1850, as follows: 

"One man mines for me. He digs me $30 or 
$40 every day. 

Despite its former prosperity, however, ' the 
history of Salmon Falls is conspicuously lacking 
in those sensational features which were char- 
acteristic of the old-time mining towns. The 
records tell of no violent crimes done in that 
settlement. 

Berry erected a large two-story frame house in 
1850 at a cost of $5000. Here Berry and his fam- 
ily lived for many years, and here, also, Berry, 
his wife and three of their children died. 

That dreaded scourge, cholera, found its way 
into the village in 1850, but only one death re- 
sulted, that of a young man of twenty, F. B. 
Millard, whose lonely grave, marked by a plain 
marble tombstone, can still be seen on the sum- 
mit of the hill in the rear of the old Berry house.. 
So far as known, the young man had no relatives 
in California, although his initials are the same 
as those of Frank Bailey Millard, for years a 
prominent newspaper writer in San Francisco, 
and now editor of "The Cosmopolitan." 

Destructive floods were of common occurrence 
in the Sacramento valley, below Salmon Falls. 
C. W. Haskins relates an incident which is amus- 
ing in spite of its pathos. 

A German who had lost all his possessions 
during the prevalence of a flood in Sacramento 
City, desiring to insure himself against a recur- 
rence of that disaster, moved up into the foot- 



96 PIONEEKS OF EL DoRADO. 

hills of El Dorado county and bought a wayside 
hotel. On a stormy afternoon, our friend, in 
company with his family and a few neighbors, 
was seated near the stove, enjoying the grateful 
heat and inwardly congratulating himself upon 
his escape from the perils of the lower country, 
when suddenly his wife sprang to her feet, ex- 
claiming, 

"Mine Gottl vat vas dot noise 1 hear?" 

They all jumped up, just in time to see the rear 
end of the room crushed in by a huge boulder 
which rolled swiftly : over the floor, upset the 
stove, and then, crashing through the front of 
*the building, rolled across the road and into the 
creek, about seventy-five yards below. 

For an instant fright rendered everyone 
speechless. Then the old German cried distract- 
edly, 

"Ach, mine Gott! mine Gott! How vas dot 
den? Oh, mine grashus! Vare ve go next! I 
vas most drowned out mit dose vaters in Sacra- 
mento, vas shaked all to bieces by dem earth- 
quakes at San Francisco, und den 1 vas gone 
up here, vere dem earthquakes or dem waters do 
not come at all, mid my family, und, but 
up here — mine grashus! — dem mountains 
shust come through mine house and smash dem 
all to bieces. Mine Gott! vare ve goes now to 
by oursellufs?" 

His wife suggested San Francisco. 

"Oh, mine grashus! no, no! Dem earthquakes 
down dere vill shust shakes mine head off righd 
avay, und gif mine families the shakes all oferl 
No, I tink ve vill go pack to Shairmany, for ve 
can find no place to lif here in dis strange coun- 
try. By von blace you vas shake all to bieces 



REUBEN K. BERRY. 97 

py dem earthquake; den you go to anudder 
blace, und der vater come und vash you all avay; 
den you vas find anudder blace, vare you don't 
see dem shakes or dem vaters, und den — py 
shiminy — dem hills is all loose, und dey shust 
tumble down right ofer on to mine house! I 
goes to Shairmany, mine frent, pooty quick! 
Now don't it?" 

For twenty years after the gold discovery Cali- 
fornia was an interesting, but remote corner of 
civilization, having no means of rapid transporta- 
tion to or from the older and more settled portions 
of America. But suddenly all was changed. 
Work on the Central Pacific Railway was begun 
in Sacramento during 1863, and five years after- 
wards, in the presence of an enthusiastic people, 
was driven the golden spike which announced 
that the long and arduous undertaking was a suc- 
cess and that an unbroken chain of steel rails now 
stretched from Sacramento to the Atlantic Coast. 

On October 2, 1863, the home of Reuben K. 
Berry was darkened by the sudden death of his 
son Wellington, a boy in his nineteenth year, 
who, while at work in a hayloft on his father's 
place, fell to the ground, a distance of ten or 
twelve feet, striking on his head and shoulders in 
such a manner as to break his neck and to bring 
almost instantaneous death. Nearly eight years 
afterward, on March 12, 1871, Reuben Kelley 
Berry himself passed away, after a lingering ill- 
ness from consumption. But his faithful com- 
rade, Amanda Phelps Berry, loyally cherished by 
her only surviving child, Edward Theodore, lived 
until May 10, 1884, when she, too, sought her rest, 
having been afflicted with dropsy during the last 
two years of her life. At his mother's request,, 



98 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

shortly before her death, Edward was married to 
Miss E. L. Boles of Rattlesnake Bar— now Monte 
Rio — Placer county, the bride being the daughter 
of Ralph Boles, who, with his brother, Isaac 
Boles, arrived in El Dorado county September 20, 
1850, and camped for a time in Placerville on the 
site now occupied by the Court House. Mr. 
Boles later mined on what is now the Warner 
Homestead at Pilot Hill, while his brother kept 
store on the well-known Bayley place in that set- 
tlement. Ralph Boles afterward mined for years 
on the North Fork of the American river— now a 
part of the boundary line of El Dorado and Placer 
counties — and he also conducted extensive min- 
ing operations on the South Fork of the same 
river at Salmon Falls. For years he has lived 
with his son-in-law, Edward T. Berry. Not- 
withstanding his advanced years, he still retains 
his interest in an occupation which he can no 
longer follow, and nothing delights him more 
than to relate to you at any time some of the 
varied experiences of his eventful career. His 
daughter, Mrs. Edward T. Berry, has always 
borne an unblemished reputation, and is a most 
excellent example of what a wife and mother 
should be— devoted to all her family, and raising 
her children in a normal environment of love and 
common sense, unsullied by that senseless 
prudery — so common in many homes — which 
curbs every natural impulse of childhood and 
turns your children into men and women before 
their time. 

The four children of Edward T. Berry and his 
wife are the natural products of inherited tenden- 
cies and a model home life. Ralph, Mabel and 
Stella are no longer children, and they are enter- 




D 

8 

s 

ju 

T! 

,4 
l 



REUBEN K. BERRY. 99 

ing upon life's duties sustained by those high 
ideals which insure them the only kind of suc- 
cess worth the having. Ralph is just beginning 
his studies at the University of California, pre- 
paratory to his future career; the girls are fol- 
lowing other lines of study, while Edgar is still 
a child, happy in the plays and the dreams of 
boyhood. The family left Salmon Falls in 1897, 
and now live at the Zantgraf mine, near the bor- 
der of Placer county. 

Reuben Kelley Berry did not achieve distinc- 
tion among his fellow-men, but he left to pos- 
terity that most precious of legacies — an honored 

name - 

tore. 



VII. 
ROBERT C. FUGATE, 

THE MINER OF A HALF-CENTURY. 



In historic old Virginia, "the Mother of Presi- 
dents/' the tourist may find to-day, should he 
chance to travel over a certain portion of Russell 
county, a modest little village bearing the name 
of "Fugate." But during the earlier years of 
the nineteenth century, a farm occupied the land 
across which the streets of the town extend, and 
there dwelt an Englishman, Martin Fugate, and 
his wife, Nancy Hobbs Fugate, the parents of the 
subject of this biography. 

Robert Colbert Fugate was born May 18, 1830. 
Educated in the district school, at the age of six- 



ROBERT C. FUGATE. 101 

teen he began to work out, farming, making rails, 
or doing ordinary labor, as oppoitunity offered. 

On Monday, March 25, 185u, he left home to go 
to California. He started with an ox-team across 
the continent, but was so unfortunate as to meet 
a body of Indians, who stole his team, leaving 
him no alternative but to finish the remaining 
two hundred miles of his journey on foot. It 
was a hazardous and difficult undertaking, but 
the stout-hearted young Virginian accomplished 
it. He reached California about the 27th of Au- 
gust, and on September 3 began mining with a 
rocker at Ringgold, El Dorado county. He and 
a partner mined here for a week, and at the end 
of that time "cleaned up," making just fifty 
cents apiece after all expenses were paid. The 
following week the two men worked in Mormon 
ravine, with very different results. In one day 
Fugate took out two pieces of gold, worth re- 
spectively $96 and $109, while his partner found 
a nugget valued at $63. Shortly after this, Fu- 
gate and his partner mined at the mouth of Kel- 
sey Canyon, near the South Fork of the American 
river, where in about a month they made $1800 
above expenses, and not long afterward they 
found another rich spot on Hangtown creek, 
above the falls at Cold Springs. During 1853 
they cut a ditch and brought water into their 
claim. Their earnings here averaged from fifteen 
to twenty dollars a day. 

Later, Fugate started on a visit to Illinois, but 
for some reason best known to himself he failed 
to accomplish his journey. 

At the time that Irish Dick was lynched by 
the mob in Hangtown, Fugate was living in the 
suburbs of that village. And in April, 1852, he 



102 PIONEEKS OF EL DoRADO. 

himself served as attorney for the defense in the 
Duncan case. Duncan, a Scotchman, had stolen 
$600 in gold-dust from an old man at Live Oak 
Bar who was known as "Scotch Jimmy." 
When the citizens went to capture Duncan, he 
threw his booty into the American river. At the 
trial, after his guilt was proven, death by hang- 
ing would have been the sentence passed upon 
the thief, but Fugate made an earnest plea for 
his client and Duncan was sentenced to receive 
thirty-nine lashes, to be dealt by an Irishman 
named Tom Stratton. But after twenty-six 
blows had been given him, the rope broke; 
whereupon the crowd gave Duncan a salt-water 
i bath, took him to Coloma and across the biidge 
-over the American river, and set him free with 
the warning that if they ever again caught him 
in El Dorado county they would hang him. 

It was November 3, 1854, that the execution of 
Logan and Lipsey for murder took place at Co- 
loma. It seems to be a consensus of opinion 
among the living pioneers of El Dorado county 
to-day that Logan, at least, was innocent of the 
crime for which he suffered; that the evidence 
showed conclusively that he had taken life in 
self-defense. James Logan was charged with 
the murder of one Fennell in Coon Hollow, with 
"whom he had had a dispute over a mining claim. 
William Lipsey was accused of murdering Pow- 
elson, at Cold Springs. A conviction resulted in 
each case. 

This being the first legal execution in El Do- 
rado county, there were present to witness it 
several thousand of those morbidly curious peo- 
ple who, like their savage ancestors, find a strange 
^delight in whatever is doleful or ghastly. 



ROBERT C. FUGATE. 103 

At noon Sheriff Buell proceeded to take the 
condemned men to the scaffold on the hill, the 
Coloma Hook and Ladder Company, fully armed, 
acting as a guard around the wagon provided to 
carry the prisoners. Logan walked out calmly, 
and rejecting assistance, stepped briskly into the 
vehicle beside his coffin. But Lipsey, having 
for a week eaten but little food, was weak in 
body and broken in spirit, and evidently shrank 
from his impending fate. After being assisted 
into the wagon, he remained as if in a half stupor 
until the place of execution was reached. Logan, 
with a Bible clasped in one hand, ascended the 
scaffold firmly, more with the air of a clergyman 
than that of a condemned man going to meet his 
punishment. Lipsey, on the contrary, was so 
weak that he almost had to be carried upon the 
platform- 
Sheriff Buell read the death warrant to Wil- 
liam Lipsey and asked him if he had anything to 
say, but the prisoner shook his head without 
speaking. While the warrant was being read to 
James Logan, that individual seemed to be pray- 
ing inaudibly; but when the usual question was 
asked he laid down his Bible and addressed the 
crowd, relating in full his version of the crime he 
was about to die for, and declaring that he had 
acted in self-defense. He upbraided a witness 
who had testified against him, and told the 
crowd that they were on the road to perdition, 
but that he, Logan, was saved. He continued 
speaking in a disconnected manner, but Sheriff 
Buell interrupted by informing him that it was 
time for the execution; whereupon, Logan, turn- 
ing to the Rev. Mr. Taylor, said, "We had better 
spend the remainder of the time in prayer." 



104 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

The prisoners were placed upon the drop and 
the black caps were adjusted. Logan uttered a 
silent prayer; Lipsey made neither sound nor 
motion. The clergyman uttered an eloquent plea 
for the souls of the condemned men, and the 
drop fell. 

But, unaccountably the knots had slipped, and 
the prisoners were uninjured. Logan raised the 
cap from his eyes, rose to his feet, which were 
untied, and calmly, with little assistance, re- 
ascended the scaffold. Lipsey had to be carried 
up. 

The ropes were again adjusted. After his eyes 
had been covere d, Logan demanded to see a 
watch. The cap was raised and a watch held 
before him. He remarked, "Ah, you have twen- 
ty minutes yet! If it was two o'clock I would 
demand my liberty under the law;" and he 
turned away with a subdued laugh. 

Lipsey had to be held up. After being placed 
once more upon the drop he said in a low tone,, 
as if to himself, 'i don't think I'm a murderer at 
heart." Just before the rope was cut he said, 
"Be quick as you can — I am fainting — I am just 
gone." 

Logan said, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." 
The clergyman prayed briefly, and James Logan 
and William Lipsey died with scarcely a strug- 
gle. Whether they suffered justly or unjustly, 
no mortal can know. 

Lipsey was about twenty-five years old. He 
left a written confession, in which he asserted 
that liquor alone was responsible for his down- 
fall. Logan, who was forty-seven years of age, 
also left a confession. From all accounts, Lip- 
sey was unmarried. Logan had a wife and sev- 



ROBERT C. FUGATE. 10S 

eral children. 

It is a relief to turn from this gloomy picture 
to a far brighter one which has been told by one 
of Robert C. Fugate's brother pioneers. 

A tall and lean New Englander, who was en- 
gaged in mining, was walking along a toll-road 
above Placerville one Sunday afternoon on his 
way home. 

He had been visiting some of his female ac- 
quaintances, and, naturally, was attired in his 
best suit. In lieu of a collar, however, he wore^ 
a white handkerchief. Because of his close re- 
semblance to a certain preacher who often vis- 
ited that part of the country, he was known 
among his acquaintances as "the parson.'' 

Sauntering along leisurely, he was startled by 
the abrupt appearance of a highwayman, who, 
stepping out from behind a tree, presented a re- 
volver and demanded the Yankee's money. 
Now, the New Englander was unarmed, but he 
had in his pocket a purse containing some $250,. 
which he didn't care to lose. An idea came to 
him. Why not play the part of a poor minister 
of the gospel? With that old-fashioned black 
coat and white necktie on, he surely resembled 
a preacher. 

He answered the fellow in a drawling tone, 
saying that unfortunately his profession didn't 
enable him to carry about much money, but that 
he had a prayer-book which might be sold for a 
trifle. He put his hand into his pocket to get 
the book, but the "road agent" ordered him in- 
stantly to withdraw his hand, and added that if 
he didn't give up his money at once he would be 
shot. The Yankee said drawlingly: 

"If I must go hence, first let me pray, won't 



106 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

ye?" And he promptly knelt. 

The highwayman, thinking he had encountered 
a real preacher, turned away in disgust, remark- 
ing. 

"Oh, pray away all night, if you like, and be 
d— d!" 

Four years later, in Sacramento, the "parson" 
and several of his acquaintances were enjoying 
themselves in a bar-room of a hotel when a well- 
dressed man, who seemed to be an employee 
there, stepped up to him, and, drawing him to 
one side, asked him if he had ever lived upon, 
the toll-road a few miles above Placerville. 

The "parson" replied that he had, and that he 
still lived there; that his home was in a canyon 
near the road, where he was mining. 

"You were a minister some five years ago, 
were you not?" the stranger inquired. 

"Why, no, I weren't at all, They only called 
me 'parson' because I looked so much like one. 
But say, stranger, why do you ask me these 
questions?" 

The stranger replied: "Well, because when 
that road agent demanded your money, you re- 
member you said you were a preacher, and got 
right down in the dust to pray." 

"Yaas," said the "parson," "I know that; but 
you see that chap got the drop on me, and as 1 
had no weapon with me I was bound to save 
about $250 that I had in my pocket." 

"Well," was the stranger's comment, "you did 
it well, too." 

"Why?" asked the other. 

"Why!" echoed the stranger, "because I was 
the chap who was concerned in that little funny 
business." 



ROBERT C. FUGATE. 10? 

"The h — 1 you was!" the "parson" exclaimed. 
"Why, you don't say so! Really, though?" 

"Yes, sure. You see I was on my way home 
from the other side and was dead broke, and I 
just thought to myself, 'Now here is a good 
chance.' It was my first and last trial in the 
business, for the idea of robbing a country 
preacher broke me all up. Do you notice that I 
am now bald-headed?" 

"Why, yes," his auditor answered. "What's 
the matter?" 

The stranger explained: "I was so disgusted 
with myself that 1 shed my hair all out on my way 
home." 

"Well, I'll be gol-darned!" ejaculated the 
"parson." "Let's go and take suthin'." 

Robert Colbert Fugate, the Virginian, still is at 
his old home on Granite Hill, three or four miles 
south of Coloma. He is unmarried, lives alone 
in his little cabin, and spends most of his days in 
"prospecting," though not with the success of 
yore. A reader and a student, he finds no diffi- 
culty in occupying his leisure hours. He has 
health and contentment, and he faces his waning 
years and the greater life beyond in perfect 
serenity. 



VIII. 



GEORGE W. HENRY, 



MERCHANT, SCOUT AND MINER. 



A member of the society of "Territorial Pio- 
neers of '49 and '50," George W. Henry is a typi- 
cal example of the man who lives mainly in the 
past, and whose convictions, political and non- 
political, are those of a half-century ago. 

His birth-place is Cincinnati, Ohio; the date of 
his nativity was August 27, 1825. 

On the 8th of May, 1850, George W, Henry 
joined the emigration to California, beginning his 
journey at St. Joseph, Missouri. Reaching Pla- 
cerville, El Dorado county, August 10, 1850, he 
<was first engaged in running the boarding-house 



GEORGE W. HENRY. 109 

at the Empire Hotel; thence going to Coloma, 
where he secured a position in Winter's Hotel. 
Afterward, in partnership with a Mr. Clark, he 
kept a house-furnishing store in the same town, 
besides spending a part of his time in mining. 

The Coloma of those days was a centre of at- 
traction for the miner? of that portion of the 
county. On Sundays many of the "prospectors' ' 
'would come to town with their bags of gold-dust, 
begin gambling and go home penniless at night- 
fall In addition to the saloons and gambling- 
halls, long tables were often placed in the prin- 
cipal street, and there hundreds of men would 
sit for hours and see their earnings melt away. 
Drunken miners would stagger up to the table, 
throw down bags of gold-dust and recklessly bet 
them on some roulette number. Often the bags 
would burst and scatter the yellow grains broad- 
cast. Boys would afterward "pan out" the 
street and would often find several hundred dol- 
lars' worth of gold-dust. 

In 1852 Henry was one of a party of men that 
went on a mine-hunting expedition to the prov- 
ince of Sonora, Mexico. Contrary to the law of 
that province, they entered its confines with fire- 
arms and without a permit. They sent word to 
the governor, who ordered their arrest and 
caused their arms to be stacked in the park. 
Still, the Americans were cordially treated, being 
entertained in the homes of the people while 
they were waiting; and when the permit came, 
a number of old men volunteered to guide them 
to the mines. But the guides became afraid and 
returned, and our friends gave up their search. 
On the way home the party went through the 
Mexican rendezvous of the notorious Joaquin 



110 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

Murieta, but they were not molested by any of 
the bandits. 

When Logan and Lipsey were hanged in Co- 
loma, Henry served as one of the guards. He 
was also present when Crane and Micky Free 
met their punishment on the scaffold. W. T. 
Armstrong, a well-known pioneer, now living in 
Grizzly Flat, El Dorado county, has furnished 
the principal details of the Micky Free and Crane 
affairs, as related in this book. 

On a little ranch at the head of Ringgold creek 
there lived, in 1855, a man whose name was 
Newnham. He had two daughters — Susan, who 
was unmarried, and another named Mrs. Brock, 
whose husband owned a small shingle mill in 
the canyon that empties into Webei creek near 
A. Darlington's orchard. 

At this time W. T. Armstrong and Alonzo Story 
were running a tunnel at the head of the east 
fork of this same canyon, just under what is now 
— in 1906 — the ranch of John Wall. On August 
11, 1855, two men came to the mine and in- 
formed Armstrong and his partner that they were 
searching for a man named Crane, who that very 
morning had shot and mortally wounded Miss 
Susan Newnham. 

The next day — Saturday — Armstrong and his 
partner heard loud shouting and a confusion of 
voices in the direction of the Newnham place, 
some three-fourths of a mile distant. They 
quickly dropped their tools and ran over to learn 
the cause of the uproar. When they came within 
sight of the house they beheld a great crowd of 
men on the slope which ascended to the left of 
the road. Upon joining the throng, they found 
that the men were making preparations to lynch 



GEORGE W. HENRY. Ill 

the murderer. One man was up in a large oak 
tree, putting one end of a rope over a branch,, 
while the other end was tied into a noose. It 
was the crowd's intention to hang Crane in full 
view of the house where the murdered girl lay. 

From Jesse Steiner, a partner of Brock, Arm- 
strong learned the particulars of the shooting. It 
seems that Crane had gone to the gate in front of" 
the Newnham residence that morning, and call- 
ing to John Newnham, Susan's cousin, asked 
him to tell the girl to come out to the gate, as he 
wished to talk to her. At first Susan refused to 
comply, but her cousin urged her to go and hear 
what Crane had to say. She finally went, and 
Crane, after talking with her a few minutes, drew 
his pistol, and throwing one arm around the girl, 
fired. But his aim was poor, and Susan, her 
shoulder bleeding, broke away, and ran toward 
the house. Just as she was going up the steps 
at the door, Crane fired again, and the bullet 
struck the girl fairly in the back of the head just 
under the coil of her hair, and, ranging forward: 
and upward, lodged against the skull, slightly 
above the forehead. John Newnham ran im- 
mediately toward the shingle-mill to inform his 
other cousin and her husband of what had oc- 
curred. Steiner hurried over— Mr. and Mrs. 
Brock following — and was the first outsider to 
reach the spot of the tragedy. In the house he 
found Crane, who had helped to lay Susan on 
the bed and was now talking to her. Crane 
asked, "Are you not my wife, Susan?" But she 
answered, "No. Go away and let me alone. You 
have hurt me enough now/' Crane then left the 
house and went toward the woods. He was not 
found that day, but the next morning he came 



112 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

back to see how Susan was, and gave himself up 
to some men who were at the place. The news 
quickly spread, and by the time W. T. Armstrong 
and his partner reached the spot there were 
probably two thousand men gathered there. 

Crane was sitting on the ground, and appeared 
to be the coolest man in all the throng. His 
arms and hands were covered with blood from 
gashes he had made in his wrists in an endeavor 
to commit suicide. He stated that he had tried 
to shoot himself, but that his revolver wouldn't 
work; then he had attempted to go by hanging, 
but his children had clung to him so persistently 
that he could not. — He had a wife and family 
living in an Eastern state. — He said that he was 
anxious to die, but did not like the idea of hang- 
ing; but if they would give him a revolver he 
would show them how a Kentuckian could die. 

Some of the crowd were in favor of hanging 
him then and there. Coloma was still the 
county seat and the Grand Jury was in session 
at that time. Word had been sent to Sheriff 
Buell, asking him to come to the rescue; and 
many of the throng were doing all in their power 
to protect Cirane until the officer could arrive. 
But the men who favored lynching proposed to 
appoint a sheriff, judge and jury, go over to Red 
Hill — a mining-camp half a mile distant — and: 
give the culprit a trial. The motion was carried;. 
Sam Smith of Diamond Springs was chosen 
sheriff, and he took charge of the prisoner and 
started, followed by the entire crowd, some of 
whom carried the rope, being anxious to have an 
opportunity of pulling on it when Crane should 
be safely noosed at the other end. Others were 
willing to be passive spectators at a lynching,,. 



GEORGE W.;HENRY. 113 

but declined to take an active part; while still 
others wanted to see Crane dealt with legally. 

A cabin was found and "sheriff," "judge" and 
''jury" proceeded with the "trial" behind a 
closed door; but before the "case" was ended, 
Sheriff Buell, with a posse of able-bodied men — 
one of whom was the late Henrys Larkin — came 
galloping up. 

Sheriff Buell dismounted from his horse and 
started for the door; but the mob, closing about, 
him, completely barred his progress. He mount- 
ed his horse and rode into the crowd, talking to 
its members and urging them to respect the law, 
and assuring them that Crane would receive the 
punishment which he surely merited. He then 
called upon every able-bodied man to assist in 
protecting the culprit, and warned them that 
everyone who resisted laid himself liable to the 
law. This admonition deterred a great many 
persons from taking an active part in the affair. 
Sheriff Buell again dismounted; and while a^ 
mounted member of the posse held his chief's 
horse, another rode through the crowd to a little 
window in the cabin, and, taking the noose end' 
of the rope which someone inside handed out* 
he dropped it over the horn of his saddle, and, 
putting spurs to his horse, dashed away with the 
prize. 

Meanwhile Sheriff Buell, conspicuous in the 
throng because of his towering height— six-and- 
a-half feet— was fighting his way to the door. 
Reaching it finally, amid a confusion of yells of 
"hang him!" "lynch him!" the Sheriff turned his 
back to the door, and, drawing his revolver, said 
grimly, "1 will shoot the first man that lays a 
hand on me!" So saying, he threw himself 



114 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

against the door, forcing it open far enough to en- 
able him to get one arm and shoulder inside; 
then, lifting it from the hinges, he entered. 
After a short struggle, he fought his way out 
with Crane under his arm, while the angry men 
round ibout kept grabbing wildly at the prisoner 
until all of his clothes except undershirt, over- 
alls and socks had been torn from his person. 
Members of the posse had horses in readiness. 
Sheriff Buell threw Crane upon one steed, 
mounted another himself, and in a twinkling the 
brave officer, with his prisoner, had swept like a 
whirlwind through the mob and was gone. 

Sheriff David BuelTs heroic deed stands out in 
vivid contrast to the pusillanimous conduct of 
some of our other peace officers, among whom 
might be mentioned Sheriff William Rogers of 
"Indian War" and ''Bullion Bend" fame. 

The Grand Jury being in session at Coloma, 
Crane was indicted without delay. . A few days 
later court was convened and the murderer was 
tried, convicted and sentenced to be hanged on 
October 26, the same day which was set for the 
execution of Mickey Free. After his conviction, 
Crane wrote a confession, in which he gave his 
reasons for killing the girl. He was a firm be- 
liever in spiritualism and a scoffer at all other re- 
ligious theories and creeds. He asserted that 
Susan's ideas had been the same as his own on 
this subject, and he and the girl had mutually 
agreed that, as they could not marry and live to- 
gether in this world, he should kill her and then 
kill himself. Another statement he made was 
that he had killed Susan in order to hide her 
shame. But all persons who were well ac- 
quainted with the girl declared both of Crane's 



GEORGE W. HENRY. 115 

statements to be utterly false. However, Crane 
died firm in the belief that he and Susan Newn- 
ham would be united in the "spirit world." 

In relation to Mickey Free, who met his death 
on the same date, 'The Georgetown News," in 
its issue of October 4, 1855, quoted as follows 
from "The San Francisco Herald" of September 
29, in the same year; 

"Some months ago, a large section of the in- 
terior country, embracing portions of the counties 
of Calaveras, El Dorado and Placer, was the the- 
atre of a series of horrible and mysterious mur- 
ders attributed to Mexican banditti. In most 
cases, the victim was a miner, known to have 
been working a good claim, and situated in a lo- 
cality where in case of an attack by robbers he 
would have little chance of escape, and still less 
of assistance from neighbors. In several in- 
stances, men were murdered and their bodies 
burned on the spot; and upon making search for 
the missing, the only ground for suspicion that 
the party sought for had been murdered, was in 
the fact that his tent or cabin bore traces of hav- 
ing been rifled and of the evident hasty de- 
parture of the occupant. The officers of the law 
were unable to gain any trace to the route pur- 
sued by the murderers, or of their number and 
character, although it was universally believed 
that they were Mexicans. Some weeks since, a 
murder was committed in El Dorado county and 
suspicion attached to a man named Wilson, and 
although there was nothing of proof sufficient to 
warrant his arrest, a deputy sheriff of that 
county resolved to try what could be done by 
stratagem, and accordingly approached Wilson 
and charged him directly with the murder. Wil- 



116 PIONEERS OF ED DORADO. 

son manifested every symptom of guilt, and im- 
mediately exclaimed, 'Have they caught Kelly?' 
The officer said, 'Yes, we have got Kelly/ when 
the other replied, Then the d— d scoundrel has 
blowed it upon me!' Wilson was immediately 
taken to Coloma jail, where he was induced to 
become State's evidence, with the condition that 
he should be liberated upon the conviction of his 
partners in crime. He then commenced a long 
narrative of murders, to which he had been a 
witness and party, and implicating two men 
named Kelly and Mickey Free, with whom, it 
appears, he was associated in nearly every mur- 
der that has been committed in the section of 
the county specified during the last year. He 
related his story with such minute detail, appar- 
ently exhibiting such a wonderful power of 
memory, that his listeners were almost induced 
to the belief that they were being deceived by 
the imaginings of a madman. Many of the cir- 
cumstances which he related, however, were in 
some measure known to the officer, and a care- 
ful note was taken of all the description which he 
gave relative to the position of the bodies of 
men that had been murdered by him and his 
companions, and burned as a precaution against 
immediate investigation of the murder. In every 
instance these descriptions were found to be 
-wonderfully correct, even to such details as the 
tearing of a garment and stuffing the fragments 
into the mouth of the victim, to prevent his call- 
ing for assistance. Bodies of murdered men, 
described by him as having been burned at a 
distance from any habitation, were found in the 
exact position indicated. The form and color of 
~a rock, the peculiar inclination of the branches 



GEORGE W. HENRY. 117 

and shrubbery of a tree in a spot visited by him 
but once, and then under circumstances which 
gave little time or opportunity for remark, were 
described by him with such accuracy that the 
officers had only to refer to the chart which he 
had marked out for their guidance, and they 
were sure of finding the objects which it indicat- 
ed. Soon after the arrest of Wilson, a police- 
man of this city visited him in his cell at Coloma 
jail, with the view of ascertaining if he was the 
person of the same name who is accused of mur- 
dering a man in Monterey county, some years 
since. As soon as the officer enteied the cell he 
saw that Wilson was not the man he was looking 
for, and immediately turned away — when the 
jailer remarked to the officer: Til bet Wilson 
can describe to me every article of your dress.' 
The officer remained in a position where he could 
listen without being seen by the prisoner, and 
was startled to hear a complete description, not 
only of his apparel, but even of ^peculiarities of 
his person which he himself had never previous- 
ly noticed. 

" It is admitted by all that a man of such re- 
markable talent, capable of employing it in the 
manner illustrated by his own story of crime, is 
too dangerous a person to be allowed his liberty. 
Mickey Free, one of the murderous trio, has been 
arrested, and will undoubtedly be executed. 
Kelly had not been captured at last accounts, but 
it is believed that he is in the State, and cannot 
finally escape the punishment which is justly 
due for the crimes he is said to have commit- 
ted." 

Such was a portion of the blackest record of 
crime in El Dorado county annals. Many old 



118 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO, 

pioneers assert that Mickey Free, who seems to 
have been the leader of the gang, had boasted 
frequently that he would outdo even the bloody 
deeds of Joaquin Murieta and his band of cut- 
throats. 

On October 26, 1855, James B. Crane and 
Mickey Free paid the penalty for their misdeeds. 
W. T. Armstrong, who was at the execution, and 
whose tenacious memory has supplied the de- 
tails of the tragedy, estimates that there were 
probably five thousand spectators, comprising 
men and boys and a certain class of women. 

Crane had prepared an address, which he de- 
livered as coolly as if he were making a speech 
from a political rostrum. Then, in a clear voice, 
unshaken by fear or excitement, he sang, to 
the tune of the "Indian Hunter/' some verses 
he had composed for the occasion. The song 
finished, Crane removed from his eyes a pair of 
colored glasses which he constantly wore, put 
them into the case, and laid them in his hat; 
took off his cravat, folded it carefully, and placed 
it with the spectacles; then unbuttoned his collar 
and turned it back as if in readiness for the hang- 
man's noose. He seemed impatient for the end 
to come, yet acted as naturally as if he were pre- 
paring for a pleasure trip. 

In the meantime Mickey Free, his hat cocked 
over one eye, was walking back and forth upon 
the scaffold, eating peanuts and flipping the 
shells around him. He examined the noosed 
ropes which hung from the beam over the trap, 
made a feeble attempt to dance, tried to look un- 
concerned and seemed to be enjoying his tem- 
porary notoriety. 

When Crane stopped singing, Mickey Free 



GEORGE W. HENRY. 119 

stepped to the front and tried to sing, but he 
broke down completely. The two men were 
now led to the trap and the ropes were adjusted. 
Mickey said, "Now, do this thing up right, 
boys." Crane, as the black cap was drawn over 
his face, exclaimed, "Here I come, Susan!" 
When they dropped, Crane died without a strug- 
gle; but the knot slipped to the back of Mickey 
Free's neck and he was literally choked to death. 
His suffering was frightful. 

In this manner died two of the most remark- 
able freaks in the history of El Dorado county: 
Mickey Free, with scarcely a redeeming trait of 
character; and James B. Crane, a product of 
spiritualism, that insane doctrine of halluci- 
nations and superstitions, which has furnished, 
and continues to furnish, a considerable portion 
of our lunatics and criminals. 

The lines composed and sung by Crane, al- 
though they possess but little merit from a liter- 
ary standpoint, are here given in evidence of the 
erratic workings of a weak and diseased mind: 

"Come, friends and all others, I oid }ou adieu; 
The grave is now open to welcome me through ; 
No valley of shadows I see on the road, 
But angels are waiting to take me to God. 

"The body no ^nger my spirit can chain; 
This day I am going from sorrow and pain; 
The necklace and gallows will soon .set me free, 
Then joyous and happy my spirit will be. 

"Then millions and millions of ages may roll- 
Progression be ever the theme of my soul — 
To beauty and grandeur I'll ever be wed, 
And worlds without number my spirit shall tread. 
"Ye wordlings and Christians may sneer and may frown; 
Your unfounded systems are fast tumbling down; 
And sorrow and sadness will give way to mirth, 
And peace and good-will shall extend o'er the earth. 



120 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

"I'm going, I'm going to the land of the free, 
"Where all love eaeh other and ever agree; 
I'm going, I'm going, I'm going, I'm gone: 
O friends and relations, 'tU done, it|is done." 

Thus closes one of the many sensational epi- 
sodes which characterized life in El Dorado 
county during the earlier years of George W. 
Henry's sojourn in that portion of the Far West 

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Henry, 
whose sympathies lay with the Southern people 
hurried South and received an appointment in 
the Secret Service of the Confederacy. Here he 
served until the war closed, when he returned to 
California, 

Since that period, and until the infirmities of 
age prevented, he followed his old occupation of 
mining. Living in the neighborhood of historic 
Kelsey — now Slatington— he and his faithful 
wife are always ready for an agreeable reminis- 
cent chat with friend or stranger. 



IX 



GELWICKS AND JANUARY, 



THE PIONEER EDITORS. 



The modern newspaper, be its field great or 
small, is the most potent influence for good or 
evil in every neighborhood; and the man whose 
privilege it is to be the founder of a pioneer 
journal, which records the beginning of history in 
a new and growing community, should deem his 
lot an especially happy one. 

Such a distinction was accorded Daniel W« 
Gelwicks, founder of "The Mountain Democrat" 
in Placerville, El Dorado county, the "Empire 
County" of old-time California. 

Daniel W. Gelwicks was born in Hagerstown, 
Maryland, December 16, 1821. Leaving Mary- 



122 PIONEERS OF EL DuRADO . 

and when he was 20 years of age, he went to 
Belleville, Illinois, where he took up the profess- 
ion of journalism, which he followed until the 
Mexican War broke out. Joining Colonel Bis- 
selPs regiment of Illinois Infantry, he served 
creditably throughout the war; then, following 
the example of other veterans, he journeyed to 
California, the richest portion of the conquered 
territory. Here he mined for a time, but soon 
returned to his old profession of journalism. 
Going up into El Dorado county, he first started 
a paper in Coloma, in connection with John 
Conness, afterward a United States Senator. 
After a few months, in 1852, he left Coloma and 
moved to Placerville, then the most important 
mining town in the State, and started the 
"Mountain Democrat." In February, 1856, Will- 
iam A. January became a partner of Mr. Gel- 
wicks in the management of the paper. A 
paragraph from the prospectus of that journal an- 
nounces: 

"The 'Mountain Democrat/ as its name indi- 
cates, will be thoroughly and unchangeably 
democratic. The principles of the Democratic 
Party will be cordially, earnestly, zealously sup- 
ported by us. All our feelings, all our sympa- 
thies are with that party. On all occasions and 
under all circumstances we shall fearlessly, 
frankly, honestly, express our views/' 

The paper quickly became a power in the poli- 
tics of the State. The senior partner, Mr, Gel- 
wicks, proved himself to be a journalist of great 
ability. But the stand taken by his paper during 
the troublous days of the Civil War was the 
cause of much bitterness and controversy. In 
many of its utterances at that time it rivalled 



GELWICKS AND JANUARY. 123 

even the most rabid secessionist sheet in its 
senseless, bigoted and malicious attacks upon 
President Lincoln at the time that ablest of 
statesmen was doing his utmost to save the 
Union and to rid the nation of that hideous 
canker, slavery. The ''Mountain Democrat's" 
editor stood in the front rank of journalism, but 
the effect of his utterances during that fratricidal 
strife was extremely damaging to the cause he 
pretended to uphold. That is the plain truth; 
and neither the fulsome editorial published by 
that journal on the occasion of Lincoln's assassin- 
ation, nor all the explanations of its friends can 
exhibit in any better light the attitude of the 
"Mountain Democrat" in the hour of the nation's 
peril. 

In 1861 Mr. Gelwicks was married to Miss 
Frances Slater, daughter of the Reverend Nelson 
Slater of Sacramento. This same year he became 
a member of the Masonic fraternity, an order in 
which he retained an ardent interest until his 
death, 

A few years after his marriage, he was elected 
State Printer, which office he conducted ably and 
economically. At the close of his four-years' 
term, he sold the "Mountain Democrat" and went 
to Oakland, where he spent the remainder of his 
life. He represented Alameda county one term 
in the Legislature. Later he became editor and 
proprietor of the "Oakland Independent." His 
connection with that journal ended when Gov- 
ernor Stoneman appointed him Director of State 
Prisons. His management of that arduous po- 
sition was such as to win the admiration and 
confidence of his colleagues. Mr. Gelwicks died 
suddenly November 24, 1884. 



124 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

Daniel W. Gelwicks did much, in his official 
and his later journalistic career, toward the up- 
building of his adopted State. He was a man of 
great natural kindliness and his friends were 
legion. He deserves a conspicuous place in 
California's history. 

William Alexander January, junior partner in 
the firm of Gelwicks and January, was born in 
Marysville, Kentucky, February 16, 1826. He 
learned the printer's trade at Corydon and New 
Albany, Indiana, and came across the plains to 
California, by the Lassen route, in 1849, arriving 
at Sacramento in October of that year. During 
the winter of 1849 and the summer of 1850 he 
worked in the mines along the Feather river: 
went to Placerville during the fall and mined in 
Hangtown creek, Cedar and Oregon Ravines and 
various other places until the autumn of 1853, 
when he was employed in the office of the 
"Empire County Argus" at Coloma. When the 
"Mountain Democrat" was established in Placer- 
ville, Mr. January was employed on that paper, 
and in 1855 he became a partner with Mr. Gel- 
wicks in the ownership of the journal. 

William A. January was married in Placerville, 
April 5, 1855, to Miss Mary Helen Murgotten. 
Nine children were born to them, two of whom 
died in infancy, and another at 15 years of age. 
The remaining children grew up and married,. 
and all but one are still living. 

In December, 1865, Mr. January sold his share 
in the "Mountain Democrat" to Mr. Gelwicks,. 
came to San Jose and started the ''Santa Clara 
Argus," which he published until 1879. Before 
leaving Placerville, Mr. January had served one 
term as County Glerk of El Dorado county, and 



GELWICKS AND JANUARY. 125 

he is now filling the same office for the fourth 
time in Santa Clara county. 

That William A. January is an efficient and 
popular servant of the people is attested by the 
subjoined list of offices he has held in California 
since 1872: 

Treasurer and Tax Collector of Santa Clara 
county, 1872-1879; State Treasurer of California, 
1882; Tax Collector of Santa Clara county, 1892 
to the present time, 1906. 

Besides his attainments in politics, Mr. Janu- 
ary has held prominent positions in the various 
Masonic fraternities. 

Up to 1856, four years after Daniel W. Gel- 
wicks founded the pioneer newspaper, Placer- 
ville had suffered little injury from fires; but on 
April 15, 1856, while a large number of people 
were gathered in the Placerville Theatre, to see 
McKean Buchanan in the character of ''Rich- 
elieu/' a fire broke out in the Iowa House on 
Sacramento street and in a very short time had 
spread to the neighboring houses, all of which, 
except the Post Office and Hooker's store, were 
built of the most combustible material. Dr. 
Rankin's office and the adjoining building, the 
Placer Hotel across the street, the Orleans Hotel 
and a number of smaller buildings, all fell a prey 
to the flames. Then Stephens' new livery stable 
ignited, and had it not been for a sudden 
changing of the wind the entire town would 
probably have gone up in smoke, despite the ex- 
ertions of the fire department, aided by many 
citizens and the members of the theatrical troupe. 
Even as it was, the property loss of more than 
one citizen represented to him the labor of five 
long years. Cary lost $15,000; Levan, $12,000; 



126 PIONEERS OP EL DORADO. 

and the other sufferers, some twenty in number,, 
had lost amounts ranging from $100 to $4000. 

One incident of the conflagration deserves 
special mention. After the inmates of the Iowa 
House had rushed in terror from the building, 
and just as the firemen drew near, a Mrs. Rock- 
well suddenly cried out that her youngest child 
had been left, lying asleep, in one of the rooms 
of the burning structure. Hearing this, Jackson 
L. Ober, the fourteen-year-old son of Dr, Ober, 
ran forward, and, regardless of the danger, 
plunged into the flame and smoke and hurried to 
the room where the infant lay, Gathering the 
child into his arms, he cautiously felt his way 
back through the stifling air, reached the door 
and laid the little one within its mother's arms 
just a moment before the burning walls col- 
lapsed. A burn on the young hero's arm left a 
scar that was a lasting memento of his brave act. 

That was a year of misfortune for the busy 
mountain city. On July 6 another fire occurred 
which literally swept the main portion of the 
town; while on the 7th of October a conflagra- 
tion started in the Pittsburg House of Upper 
Placerville. destroying the greater part of that: 
suburb. This fire' is said to have been caused 
accidentallv by John Murdock, who was a tenant 
of the hotel, and went to bed, intoxicated, shortly 
before the discovery of the flames, and was 
burned to death. The property losses were as 
follows; J. W. Foster, $5,500; S. W. Wilcox, 
$8,000; W. Flagg, $5,000; A. C. Crosby. $3,000; 
N. Wonderly, owner of Pittsburg House, $3,009 r 
Mr. Monroe, $3,500; E, Brewster and Co., $2,000- 
Dr. S. Baldwin, $3,000; J. M. Dorsey, $3,000;: 
Mr. Gilbert, $500; Mr. Fleischman, $250; Alden & 



GELWICKS AND JANUARY. 127 

Stout, $1750; Joe Acker, $7S0; Mr. Morrison, $2- 
000; M. Livingston, $1,000; Mr. Spencer, $1,000; 
William Christian, $1,500; Jacob Wirt, $1,000, 

Between three and four o'clock in the morning 
of November 6, 1864, a fire was discovered on 
Benham Place. It spread rapidly along 
Benham Place, Quartz, Pacific and Sacramento 
streets, threatening the entire town; but it was 
fortunately checked. Considerable property was 
destroyed, however. W, Cooper, lost fifteen 
houses; J. Brindley, four; J. Patton, ten; J. Wray, 
six; Mr. Howard, four; H. Otis, nine; Henry 
Lewis, three; J. Jeffrey, two; L. Landecker, 
three; Mr. Simmons, one. 

Again, on August 10, 1865, another fire started, 
this time on Quartz street, in a building owned 
by Mr. Seeley. The principal losses were: 
Thomas Alderson, $10,000; William Thatcher, 
$5,000; Thomas Hogsett. $2,000; Mr. Phipps, 
$1,000; Mr. Seeley, $3,000; R. H. Black, $1,600; 
John Marcovich, $1,500; Mr. Woodland, $1,000; 
L. Landecker, Howard Espanna, H. H. Thall, R. 
White and J. B. Jenkins, from $500 to $1,000 
each. 

Great had been the ravages of the "fire fiend" 
during those few short years; but despite the 
temporary loss, Placerville was eventually bene- 
fitted by its afflictions; for better structures and 
a more efficient fire department have gradually 
taken the place of the old. And "The Mountain 
Democrat," as well as its later-day contempo- 
raries, has kept pace with the march of progress. 
The days of the old hand-press have vanished 
and now a rapid, motor-driven cylinder printing- 
press turns out each edition for the waiting sub- 
scribers. 



GEORGE C. RANNEY, 



SPECIAL DEPUTY-SHERIFF AT BULLION BEND, 



Descended from the highest types of Anglo- 
Saxon manhood and womanhood, and inured for 
more than three centuries to the rigors and 
hardships of a cold and storm-swept coast, the 
people of New England have naturally become 
leaders in every line of human endeavor. When 
chattel slavery and "state rights'' threatened the 
life of the nation, New England's sons were 
among the first to protect the heritage come 
down to them from the battle-fields of the 
Revolution; and to-day, when a far greater peril, 
Industrial slavery, menaces the very foundation 



george:c. RANNEY. 129 

of America's liberties, again are the descendants 
of the Puritans marching in the vanguard of the 
army of emancipation. 

George C. Ranney, a true son of New Eng- 
land, was born in Middletown, Connecticut, 
April 22, 1827. When the boy was fifteen years 
of age, the family moved to Hartford. 

In December, 1848, George C. Ranney became 
a member of the "Hartford Union Mining and 
Trading Company," organized principally for the 
purpose of mining and trading in California. On 
the morning of February 17, 1849, Ranney, to- 
gether with the other members of the Company, 
boarded the ship, "Henry Lee," lying in the East 
River, New York City, and began the long and 
perilous trip around Cape Horn. Arriving in 
San Francisco Bay on September 13, Ranney, 
House, McKinstry, Griggs, Prindle and others 
chartered a steamer— paying $25 apiece, and 
came up the river to Sacramento. In that city 
they hired a worn-out ox-team to convey them- 
selves and their effects to Hangtown, as it was 
then called. Reaching the latter place about the 
first of November, they began mining as soon as 
their health permitted. All the party had become 
sick on the way up from Sacramento, probably 
on account of the sudden change from ship- 
board to land. 

They settled in a cabin which they bought, 
partially finished, and prepared for winter before 
they began working. During his first day of 
"prospecting" in Spanish Ravine, Ranney took 
out about $76 with a little rocker he had made, 
from a description, while aboard ship. Ranney 
thinks that he made the first "long-torn" seen in 
California, but he is not positive. Ranney fol- 



130 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

lowed mining, diversified with an occasional job 
of carpentering, until 1861. It was shortly after 
this that he was elected constable in Placerville. 

Between nine and ten o'clock, on the evening 
of June 30, 1864, the two coaches of the Pioneer 
Stage Line, bringing silver bullion from Virginia 
City, Nevada, were stopped at Bullion Bend, 
above Sportsman's Hall and fourteen miles from 
Placerville, by six men, armed with shotguns 
and pistols, and eight sacks of bullion were 
stolen. Ned Blair was driving the first team, 
and Charles Watson the second. Blair was or- 
dered to halt. The robbers next demanded the 
treasure-box of the express company. Blair 
answered that he had none; whereupon he was 
commanded to throw out the bullion. He re- 
plied, "Come and get it!" Two of the bandits at 
once covered him with their guns, v/hile two of 
their companions came forward and took out the 
.bullion. They did not secure the treasure-box, 
however. Blair requested them not to rob the 
passengers. They replied that they had no in- 
tention of doing so, but that all they wanted was 
the treasure-box of Wells, Fargo & Company. 

Seeing that Blair's stage had halted, and sup^ 
posing that the driver had met with an accident, 
Watson stopped his team, got down, and hurried 
to his assistance; but two of the robbers ad- 
vanced, with shotguns leveled, and, ordering 
him back, at the same time demanded the treas- 
ure-box and bullion. Watson had no alternative 
but to comply. The bandits took from his stage 
a small treasure-box — from Genoa — and three 
^sacks of bullion. Both stages were filled with 
passengers, but, as it happened, none was armed. 

The leader of the band, before leaving, handed 



GEORGE C. RANNEY. 131 

Watson this receipt: 

"This is to certify that I have received from 

Wells, Fargo & Co., the sum of $ , cash, for 

the purpose of out-fitting recruits enlisted in. 
California for the Confederate States army. 

R. Henry Ingrim, 
Captain Commanding Company. C. S. A." 

"June, 1864. 

Between one and two o'clock the next morn- 
ing the two stages came into Placerville, bring- 
ing news of the robbery. Immediately Sheriff 
William Rogers appointed Constable George C. 
Ranney a special deputy-sheriff; then the sher- 
iff, accompanied by Ranney, Deputy-Sheriff John 
Van Eaton, Deputy-Sheriff Joseph Staples, and- 
also a "trailer" and a posse of six or eight men, 
started in pursuit of the robbers. Sheriff Staples 
and the posse secured a fast freight wagon and 
hurried to Bullion Bend, the scene of the hold- 
up. Ranney, Van Eaton and Staples first went 
on horseback to the junction of the Placerville 
and Diamond Springs road and a cross-road' 
which led from the stage-road at a place near 
Bullion Bend. Going up the Diamond Springs 
and Placerville thoroughfare, they discovered the 
track of the robbers, who had evidently taken 
another road and gone south, crossing the North 
Fork of the Cosumnes river. 

Ranney and his companions held a consulta- 
tion. Van Eaton, who was still suffering from a 
bullet wound received in a skirmish with another 
gang of criminals some weeks before, did not 
feel able to stand a long ride. Accordingly, it 
was decided that Van Eaton, instead of accom- 
panying Ranney and Staples, should go to the 
scene of the robbery and notify Sheriff Rogers of 



332 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

their discovery of the bandits' trail. So Van 
Eaton turned back and Ranney and Staples 
crossed the river and followed the tracks of the 
robbers. They reached the Somerset House at 
the summit of the hill beyond the stream, just 
after daybreak. Here they wished to make some 
inquiries; accordingly they dismounted, and, 
Pitching their horses, started toward the house, 
Ranney going to an open door at the farther end 
of the building, while Staples went to the kitchen 
4oor. 

When Ranney entered the room, he beheld 
five or six men, some lounging about on the floor 
and others on a sofa at one side of the apart- 
ment. All were armed, and at the moment Ran- 
ney stepped inside he noticed that every one of 
them put a hand upon a revolver. Naturally he 
felt instantly that these were the men he was 
looking for. But, without exhibiting any signs 
of suspicion, he quietly said, "Good morning/' 
and asked the road to Grizzly Flat. He was told 
that he would have to ask the landlady, as the 
men were strangers and could not give him any 
directions. Ranney thanked them, said "Good- 
by/' and, stepping outside, walked towards the 
spot where the horses were tied. 

Ten or fifteen feet away Ranney met Staples 
coming along a narrow walk and carrying a 
^double-barreled shot-gun, which he was in the 
act of cocking. Ranney motioned him to go 
back.- It was not safe to speak aloud, as the 
robbers were within hearing distance,— Staples 
did not heed the warning, but walked on in a 
very excited manner; whereupon Ranney put his 
hand on the other's shoulder to stop him. But 
the excited deputy-sheriff brushed his com- 



GEORGE C. RANNEY. 133: 

panion aside and hurried on to the door. Ran- 
ney, not wishing to desert his foolhardy com- 
rade, followed. They stepped into the room 
side by side. Staples instantly leveled his gun 
and called upon the bandits to surrender. The 
words were scarcely spoken when shots came 
from all directions. Staples fell, sank in a heap, 
fired, and dropped at Ranney's feet. His shot 
struck Poole, one of the robbers, tearing away 
one side of his face. Staples, having a shotgun, 
had drawn the first fire of the robbers. Two 
shots had gone clean through his body, and he 
died almost at the moment his own gun was dis- 
charged. Ranney and he had fired simulta- 
neously. Now, seeing that his companion was 
killed, and that he alone must contend with six 
desperadoes, Ranney turned to flee. As he did 
so, a ball struck him in his side and lodged ir* 
the muscles of the lower back. But he man- 
aged to get out of the house, and he then broke 
into a run toward the horses, intending to hide 
behind them and make an attempt to stop, the 
bandits, who had rushed out and were shooting 
at him He. succeeded in gaining the desired 
shelter, but in a twinkling his pursuers had 
dashed forward and uncovered him. 

Seeing this, Ranney sprang up and made for a 
large boulder some fifty yards" distant, turning 
sidewise and answering the fire of the robbers as 
he ran. 

Suddenly a bullet struck him in the right side* 
just below the line of the heart. A gush of 
blood came from his mouth and he fell to the 
ground, struggling for breath. 

The five bandits rushed forward, and, with 
their revolvers pointed at Ranney's head, de- 



134 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

manded, 

"Is there any more of you fellows around 
here?" 

Ranney "replied, "No," and the outlaws con- 
tinued tauntingly, 

"Did you think that two damned Yankees 
could capture six Confederate soldiers?'' 

Then followed more oaths and abuse, and 
Ranney had resigned himself to his fate, when 
suddenly a young woman emerged from the 
tiouse and came hurrying toward him. 

It was Mrs. Reynolds, a grass-widow who 
was staying with the landlady, another Mrs. 
Reynolds, though not a relative. 

Running swiftly forward, the woman shoved 
two of the bandits aside, and going up to Ran- 
ney's head, cried scornfully, 

"Ain't you ashamed! Shooting a dead man!" 

At that the robbers, evidently thinking that 
Ranney was too far gone to harm them, lowered 
their pistols and went back toward the house. 
Then, crossing the road, they entered the stable, 
brought out their horses and saddled them. 
Tearing a piece from the table-cloth, they ban- 
daged the side of one of the men whom Ranney 
had wounded during the flight from the door. 
This done, they rolled Staples' body over and 
cobbed it of a watch, some money and a pistol^ 
took forty dollars and his revolver from Ranney* 
and after substituting two of their poorer horses 
for those of Ranney and Staples, they . mounted 
and rode off. 

With the assistance of Mrs. Reynolds, Ranney 
succeeded in getting back into the house. He 
was hardly a moment too soon; for one of the 
robbers returned, and> entering the room where 



GEORGE,C. RANNEY. 135 

lay his wounded comrade, Poole, he coolly ap- 
propriated his pistols and then rode away again, 
leaving his companion in crime to die or be cap- 
tured, as the case might be. 

Ranney layon an old mattress in another room, 
trying to stop the flow of blood from the wound 
in his breast by holding his hand on it. The floor 
was sidling, and he could see where the blood 
had run in a narrow, red stream entirely across 
the apartment. He could feel himself growing 
faint, and he asked the young woman if there 
were any stimulants in the house. Sheanswered 
in the negative. Ranney seemed to recover 
momentarily, but directly he began sinking again. 
He said to the women— his preserver and her 
namesake — , 

"Pull my shirt open and see if you can do 
something to stop this bleeding, or in the next 
faint I'll gooff." 

The women were so badly frightened that they 
could do little to assist, but they managed to tear 
open the shirt, and then it was seen that the 
flowing from the wound had almost ceased and 
only a small jet was coming out. 

At sight of the clotted blood inside the shirt 
both women were near to fainting. At this junc- 
ture someone on horseback rode up to the door. 
It proved to be a physician from Diamond Springs, 
on his way to Grizzly Flat. He entered the room, 
and, after examining the wound, said gravely, 

"Looks pretty bad for you, Mister. There's two 
bullets in there." 

But he was misled by the appearance of the 
wound. The bullet, striking Ranney in the right 
side, had come out at the opposite breast, leaving 
a clean hole at both entrance and exit, and thus 



136 PIONEERS OF ED DORADO. 

giving the appearance of two wounds. 

"I can't do much for you/' the doctor contin- 
ued; "but I'll do what I can." 

He asked for some cloth, which, being given 
-him, was put into the wound, stopping the flow 
of blood. 

It was between eleven and twelve o'clock be- 
fore Sheriff Rogers and his posse arrived at the 
scene of the shooting. The Sheriff had previous- 
ly gone to Sportsman's Hall, close to Bullion 
Bend, and had arrested, on suspicion, two men 
who had come to that hotel shortly after the rob- 
bery the night before. Sheriff Rogers had these 
men in custody when Deputy-Sheriff VanEaton 
brought word that the track of the bandits had 
been found; but the Sheriff, despite this intelli- 
gence and Van Eaton's urging, continued to lin- 
ger at the Hall, holding as prisoners men against 
whom he had not even a scintilla of evidence. 
When, finally, he did arrive at the place of con- 
flict, as we have seen, all danger was over, one 
faithful officer dead and another lying wounded. 

And in the meantime news of the shooting had 
reached Placerville and Dr. Worthen had come 
out; also some other persons, including Under- 
Sheriff James B. Hume, who was out of the 
county on official business at the time of the rob- 
bery and had just returned to Placerville. Hume 
had great affection for Staples, and when he saw 
the dead body of his friend and also the living 
robber, Poole, who was not fatally injured, he 
was frantic with grief and rage. 

Shortly after this Sheriff Rogers and his posse 
returned to Placerville, taking Ranney, the 
wounded Special Deputy-Sheriff, with them, so 
lhat he might be given medical attention in a 



GEORGE C. RANNEY. 137" 

more convenient abode. The body of the ill- 
fated Staples was also carried with them; and 
the wounded robber, Poole, was taken down to 
await trial and punishment. 

Much criticism of Sheriff Rogers was indulged 
in, and not without reason. First of all, he had 
gone to Bullion Bend, the scene of the robbery 
itself, in order to capture the malefactors, when 
any sane person should have known that the 
place of crime would be the last place in which 
to look for a criminal. And, finally, when he 
learned that the track of the outlaws had been 
found, he still delayed going to his post of duty. 

Deputy-Sheriff Staples' apparently foolhardy 
act in attempting the capture of six armed des- 
peradoes was also the subject of much adverse 
comment. But the following incidents will af- 
ford a solution of that matter: 

Some time before the hold-up at Bullion Bend* 
the McCullum band of outlaws had been com- 
mitting depredations on all sides. Under-Sheriff 
Hume and Deputies Van Eaton and Staples had 
located the bandits near the road leading from* 
the Somerset House to Fiddletown. Hume and 
Van Eaton went into a thicket to drive the rob- 
bers out, leaving Staples to guard the exit. The 
outlaws opened fire, wounding Van Eaton. Sta- 
ples' horse became frightened at the shooting and 
galloped off with his rider, who was as brave a 
man as ever served the people of El Dorado- 
county. Leaving Van Eaton at a residence near 
by, Hume and Staples returned to Placerville to 
report. A physician was dispatched to attend^ 
Van Eaton and the next day Ranney went out to 
attend the wou nded officer. 

Staples happened to be in one of the Placerville 



138 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

barrooms not long after this, when one of those 
garrulous heroes who are always in the rear, 
made the remark: 

4 'Staples took damned good care to keep out of 
danger I" 

Staples, overhearing the words, said angrily, 

4 4 The next time I go I'll be brought back dead 
or I'll bring back my man!" And the tragic se- 
quel has shown that he kept his pledge only too 
well. 

After the wounded robber, Poole, had been 
lodged in the Placerville jail, he made a confess- 
ion, implicating a large number of men in a con- 
spiracy against the Federal government. He 
stated that he and his companions belonged 
to a strong company which had its rendez- 
vous in the Coast Range mountains near 
San Jose, and which had been organized for the 
purpose of bushwhacking through Southern Cali- 
fornia and into Texas, and that their party had for- 
merly belonged to the Quantrell band of guerillas 
in the South. He added that he and five others 
had been sent up into El Dorado county for the 
purpose of raising funds wherewith to equip 
themselves for the raid. 

Shortly after their encounter with Deputy- 
Sheriffs Ranney and Staples, five robbers were 
observed in the vicinity of the Somerset House. 
Later, the wounded outlaw and one of his com- 
panions disappeared and nothing more was ever 
4neard or seen of them. The three remaining 
bandits reached the rendezvous in Santa Clara 
county about ten days afterward. The Sheriff 
of that county, with a posse, was awaiting them. 
He demanded an immediate surrender. But in- 
stead of yielding, the three outlaws stood up and 



GEORGE C. RANNEY. 13» 

gave battle to the posse. One of their number 
was killed, another so badly wounded that he 
died in a day or two, while Glasby, the young- 
est of the trio, fought until his pistol stock was 
shot off and his clothing shot full of holes, be- 
fore he was captured. At the trial he was al- 
lowed to turn state's evidence and was given his 
freedom. 

On August 2, Under-Sheriff James B. Hume 
and Deputy-Sheriff John Van Eaton arrested the 
following men in Santa Clara county and brought 
them to Placerville two days later: 

Henry Jarboe, George Cross, J. A. Robertson,. 
Wallace Clendenin, Joseph Gamble, John Ingren, 
H. Gately and Preston Hodges. 

These persons and Thomas Poole, also, were 
charged by Allen P. Glasby, one of the stage- 
robbers, with being accomplices before and after 
the robbery at Bullion Bend. Upon this evidence 
the Grand Jury found bills of indictment against 
them, whereupon Judge Brockway issued war- 
rants for their arrest. They were arraigned in 
the District Court on August 19, 1864, and were 
attended by their counsel, Messrs. Hurlburt & Ed- 
gerton and J. M. Williams. The case again came 
up in the District Court on November 22. Preston 
Hodges was convicted of murder in the second 
degree, and was sentenced by Judge Brockway to 
twenty years at hard labor. Thomas Poole, the 
best man of the entire gang, was, by a strange 
miscarriage of justice, found guilty of murder in 
the first degree, and was hanged in Placerville, 
at noon on the 29th of September,1865. The re- 
maining prisoners were allowed change of venue 
to Santa Clara county, where they were tried and 
acquitted. 



140 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

The robbers had carried only a few hundred 
dollars and one bar of silver bullion from the 
scene of the robb?ry. The rest of the bullion 
was found buried near the spring at Bullion 
Bend. The bar they took with them was after- 
ward discovered under the sill of the barn at the 
Somerset House. 

George C. Ranney, who, in the capacity of a 
special Deputy-Sheriff, made so plucky a fight 
at the Somerset House, was able to be on his feet 
again about ten days after the shooting; but, as a 
memento of that fearful experience, he carries to 
this day, imbedded in the muscles of the lower 
back, the bullet which struck him as he fled from 
the apartment where Staples died. 

George C. Ranney was married in Placerville 
to Miss Matilda Hendry of Illinois, May 22, 1853. 
They had eight children, three of whom are now 
living. Mrs. Rannev died in Oakland, California, 
on the 6th day of July, 1893. 

From 1861 to 1901 Ranney followed the busi- 
ness of a carpenter and mill-wright, in which he 
was a painstaking, efficient workman. The 
author's father, Franklin Upton, of Massachusetts 
— who came to Sutter Creek, Amador county, in 
1853, and in the early Sixties moved to Placer- 
ville — was for many years associated with him 
in those occupations. He always spoke in the 
very highest terms of Mr. Ranney's ability and 
of his sterling qualities as a friend and a man. 

In 1901 George C. Ranney retired from active 
life—not because of physical disability, for his 
body is sound; but because he concluded that 
his failing memory would render it unsafe for 
'him to assume the leading part in mill-work as 
he had long been accustomed to do. 




MAIN STREET, PLACERVILLE, IN t906. 
Photo by G. W. Potter, 



GEORGE C. RANNEY. 14t 

He lives to-dav nearSlatington — Kelsey — where 
his daughter, son-in-law and two grandsons — 
lately from Colorado — are also staying. The 
men are engaged in a mining enterprise. 

Mr. Ranney has of late years become an ardent 
believer in socialism. In common with many 
other thoughtful and unprejudiced men and 
women, he looks forward confidently toward the 
day when our country shall cease to be a wealthy 
oligarchy, ruled by the idle rich for the ben- 
efit of the rich, and shall become in truth a "gov- 
ernment of the people, by the people, for the 
people/' 



XII. 
JAMES B. HUME, 

THE NOTED WELLS-FARGO DETECTIVE. 



Amongst the names of her early citizens whom 
El Dorado county delights to honor, there are few 
which stand higher than that of James B. Hume. 

He was born in Delaware county, New York, 
of Scotch parents, January 23, 1827, the family 
moving to Indiana nine years later. 

The year 1850 found James, a young man of 
23 years, on his way to California, where he ar- 
rived the same year. Until March 4, 1860, when 
he became Deputy Tax-Collector of El Dorado 
county, under J. M. Anderson, he had followed 
the usual occupations of a California pioneer. In 



JAMES B. HUME. 143 

1862 he served as Deputy-Marshal and Chief of 
Police of the city of Placerville, and in 1864 en- 
tered the Sheriff's office as Under-Sheriff of the 
county. 

While serving with Sheriff Rogers, he went to 
Santa Clara county and captured a number of the 
Bullion Bend robbers, as related in the preceding 
chapter of this history. 

During Mark Griffith's incumbency of the 
Sheriff's office, 1866 to 1870, Hume again per- 
formed the duties of Under-Sheriff. 

On Sunday, March 18, 1866, the settlement of 
Pekin, in lower Mud Springs township, was the 
scene of a desperate fight between three Chi- 
lenos, which resulted in the killing of Casas 
Rojas and Marcellius Bellasque by. Pedro Pablo. 
The murderer was arrested by other Chilenos 
who were present and was delivered into the 
custody of • Special Constable Bailey, who im- 
mediately started to Shingle Springs with his 
prisoner. The night was black and stormy, and 
the murderer, under cover of darkness, freed 
himself from the handcuffs, jumped from the 
horse and fled. The Sheriff was notified, and 
Under-Sheriff Hume and Jailor Cartheche started 
in pursuit of the runaway. -But he was finally 
discovered by a brother of one of the murdered 
men. Constables Bailey and Shrewsberry ar- 
rested the culprit and brought him to Placerville, 
Later he was tried, convicted, and sent to the 
penitentiary for a number of years. 

In the latter part of July, 1867, three desper- 
adoes, who gave their names as Faust, De Tell 
and Sinclair, started from Sacramento on a rob- 
bing expedition. They began by committing 
burglaries in houses along the road, and on Tues- 



144 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO, 

day, August 3, they stopped and robbed, above 
Sportsman's Hall, a teamster who was returning 
from Carson Valley. From there they proceeded 
up the highway, robbing houses at their pleas- 
ure, and also taking ten or twelve dollars from a 
man who was driving a sprinkling cart along the 
road. 

Under-Sheriff Hume, with a posse of three or 
four men, started in pursuit of the highwaymen^ 
Having been informed of the course of the rob- 
bers by Constable Watson of Strawberry Valley „ 
Hume and his party lay in wait for them at a 
point in the road near Osgood's toll-house. On 
the morning of August 5, at half-past elevea 
o'clock, the bandits appeared, armed with rifles. 

Hume commanded them to stop. The answer 
was a shot, which took effect in the fleshy part 
of Hume's arm, but causing no serious injury. 
The Under-Sheriff immediately ordered his men 
to fire. They obeyed, and when the smoke had 
cleared away two robbers were lying on the 

f round, one of them dead, but the other unhurU 
'he third one had been seen to fall off the bridge 
mto the creek, and they supposed that he was 
drowned; but they soon learned that he had got 
up and crawled under the bridge, where he re- 
gained until all of the Under-Sheriff s posse 
were in the toll-house; then he started back, 
towards Placerville. An hour before daylight 
Hume and his men found his trail. Soon after- 
ward they captured him a short distance above 
Brockless* bridge, and both prisoners were 
brought to Placerville and confined in the jail. 

At the trial which followed Sinclair stated that 
he was a New Yorker, 21 years old; had lately 
served under General Conner in Arizona; and 



JAMES B. HUME. 14S 

that he was one of the men who had fired upon 
the Under-Sheriff's party near Osgood's toll- 
house, He said further that the dead man was a 
German named Faust, and that his other com- 
panion's name was Hugh De Tell. Both men 
were found guilty and afterwards served a long 
term in State's Prison. 

On the morning of January 16, 1868, Joseph 
F, Rowland, a Frenchman, about 45- years old, 
was found dead in Weber creek, two hundred 
yards below his cabin, and about half a mile 
above Webertown, It was evident that he had 
been dead several days; and the fact that his 
skull was found to be split in several places at- 
tested that he had undoubtedly been murdered 
with some sharp instrument. This, and other 
accompanying circumstances convinced the Sher- 
iff that the crime had been committed by In- 
dians, and Under-Sheriff Hume and Jailor John 
Cartheche were despatched to arrest a lame In- 
dian, who spoke English and was supppsed to 
have some knowledge of the murder. 

On the search, while riding along a trail be- 
tween ,the American river and the Nine-Mile 
House, they came suddenly upon three Indians, 
armed with rifles, which they quickly leveled at 
the officers. The encounter was so unexpected 
that Hume and Cartheche had no time to draw 
their revolvers from underneath their overcoats 
and storm-coats, which, owing to the extremely 
cold weather, were tightly buttoned. That be- 
ing the case, they had no' recourse but to sit 
quietly on their horses and await the pleasure of 
the Indians. Those persons began to back off, 
keeping their rifles pointed at the officers mean- 
while, and in this manner passed gradually out 



146 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

of range and disappeared. 

Hume and Cartheche hurried to Sportsman's 
Hall and telegraphed for reinforcements; and in 
a short time, with this additional help, they suc- 
ceeded in capturing the lame Indian and several 
others whom Ihey suspected of being accom- 
plices. 

The Indians who had escaped from Hume and 
Cartheche proved to have been no other than 
"White Rock Jack" and two of his partners in 
crime. The lame Indian confessed to having 
been with the three when the murder was com- 
mitted. His testimony was corroborated by the 
circumstantial evidence in the case. He, as well 
as two other Indians who v/ere subsequently 
caught, served a term in San Quentin; but 
" White Rock Jack" was not apprehended until 
nearly three years later. 

It was on Wednesday, July 27, 1870, that the 
Indians from the vicinity of American and Co- 
lumbia Flats gave a banquet in true "Digger" 
style on Irish Creek; and "White Rock Jack/' 
being unable to resist the temptation to be pres- 
ent at, and participate in, the festivities, rashly 
came out of his mountain hiding-place and re— 
paired to the place of feasting. 

In some way the Indians had managed to pro- 
cure liquor for the occasion; and Jack's appetite 
once more proved his undoing, for be became 
beastly drunk. Thereupon, two Indians hastened 
to the store at Columbia Flat and informed the 
proprietor, Mr. Anderson, of Jack's proximity and 
also his condition. They accompanied Anderson 
to the spot and not only pointed out. but helped 
to bind, the Indian bandit, who was forthwith 
brought to Placerville by Anderson, Breeze and 



JAMES B. HUME. 147 

another person and delivered to the authorities. 
Thus, after innumerable stratagems by the 
county officers, this wily desperado, for whose 
capture the county had offered a reward of $500, 
and Governor Haight an additional $300, was 
finally secured. 

When Jack's trial began in the District Court 
on March 3, 1871, he was found guilty of murder 
in the second degree and sentenced by Judge 
Adams to hard labor in the State Prison for life/ 
Jack received his sentence with stolid indiffer- 
ence, but it is fold that when he reached his cell 
he broke down and wept at the thought of a 
life-long incarceration between the cheerless 
walls of San Quentin. Jack was then but 23 
years of age and, physically, was a superior 
specimen of the Digger Indian. 

In the latter part of May, 1870, Jesse Hen- 
dricks, an employee of the South Fork Canal 
Company., disappeared mysteriously from his 
camp on the canal, eight miles above Placerville, 
and, notwithstanding the fact that a very careful 
search was made by a large number of men, no 
traces of him could be found. The circumstances 
indicated foul play and suspicion rested upon 
the notorious " White Rock Jack." 

More than six years after, on December 19, 
1876, a deer hunter found, near the South Fork 
of the American river, about seven miles above 
Placerville, two sections of a human skull, one 
portion lying near the river-bank, and the other 
on the top of a bluff, perhaps fifty feet above. 
Coroner Collins, having been informed of the 
discovery, went up with a party to make an in- 
vestigation, December 21. Going first to the big 
flume on the old Jack Johnson ranch, they went 



148 PIONBBRS OF EL DORADO. 

from that point directly to the river; and not far 
from the stream they found the two pieces of 
skull and also a miner's shovel. Further up 
they discovered a boot containing the bones of a 
human foot, and still further along they came 
upon another boot in which were the bones of a 
foot and the leg from the knee down. Pursuing 
their search yet further, up a steep, marshy 
ascent, most difficult to climb, at intervals they 
found fragments of a human skeleton, the largest 
number of pieces being under a tree near the 
flume. Here and there were also particles of 
clothing, some of which were attached to vari- 
ous bones; and at a spot where it appeared that 
the body had originally lain they discovered, 
under the dead leaves and rubbish, a pocket- 
knife and several half-dollar and quarter-dollar 
pieces, aggregating exactly two dollars and twen- 
ty-five cents. The pocket-knife and some strips 
of a woolen shirt were positively identified as 
having belonged to Jesse Hendricks, the ditch 
tender, whose mysterious disappearance in May 
1870, had caused so great an excitement. Un- 
doubtedly he had been murdered, but who the 
guilty person was still remains a mystery. The 
theory that Indians had perpetrated the crime, 
as at first suspected, seems disproven by 
the discovery of the knife and the 
money, which excluded robbery, the usual mo- 
tive of a Digger Indian when taking human life. 
In 1870 the people of El Dorado county 
showed their appreciation of James B. Hume's 
efficiency as a peace officer by electing him Sher- 
iff, a position which he held until 1872, when he 
was appointed Deputy Warden of the Nevada 
State Prison. He returned to Placerville in the 



JAMES B. HUME. 149> 

spring of 1873 and during August of that year he 
entered the employ of Wells, Fargo & Company, 
and remained with them until death. 

On April 28,1884, he was married to Miss Lida 
Munson, the daughter of a prominent pioneer of 
El Dorado county. Miss Munson was born at 
Cold Springs. 

James B. Hume served Wells, Fargo & Com- 
pany long and faithfully and was one of their 
ablest and most respected employees. He be- 
came chief of their detective bureau and his 
work in that capacity was beyond criticism. He 
died at his home in Berkeley, California, May 18^ 
1904. 



XII. 



JAMES W. SUMMERFIELD. 



OF THE "GOLD LAKE" PARTY, 



The town of Union, where James Wesley 
Summerfield was born on the eleventh day of 
July, 1823, is situated in that portion of old 
Virginia which has since become the State of 
West Virginia. At his father's death, the boy was 
still a small child. 

James Summerfield was among the first to join 
the vast exodus to California. He left his native 
state in April, 1849, and reached Hangtown, El 



JAMES W. SUMMERFIELD. 151 

Dorado county, about August 1. Coming to Sac- 
ramento four days later, he sold his horses and 
other stock; then, returning to El Dorado county, 
spent the winter of 1849-50 at Kelsey, where he 
followed mining. 

In April, 1851, there came to Placerville two or 
three men who seemed to have an ample supply 
of funds, and who boasted that they had made a 
fortune and were now going "back home." 
While in Placerville the strangers gave two men 
in that town a written paper which contained 
some extraordinary statements. It described the 
location and appearance of a certain mountain 
lake, up in the Sierra Nevada range, where the 
water was of surpassing clearness, and this nar- 
rative furthermore declared that in the bottom of 
the lake itself, as well as in the bed of a stream: 
emptying into that body of water, the visitor 
could see innumerable pieces of gold, some of 
which were fully as large as a smali-size.d wal- 
nut. 

When this remarkable story was noised 
abroad, naturally it caused intense excitement. 
A number of parties were soon organized for the 
purpose of going in search of those wonderful 
waters in which fortunes could be had for the 
gathering. 

One company, of which James Summerfield 
was a member, had traveled up as far as Union 
Valley— so named by them because at that spot 
they communed and held services — when they 
became puzzled and were unable to follow the 
line of procedure as described in the paper of 
directions. Accordingly they divided their party 
and started out at random, each body of mem 
taking a different direction. 



152 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

Summerfield and his companions soon reached 
Pike's Peak— of the Sierra Nevada mountains — 
where they found snow twenty-five feet deep 
and only the tree-tops projecting above the mass 
of dazzling crystal. Luckily for our travelers, 
there was very little soft snow to make the way 
difficult. Following up Silver Creek to a con- 
venient ford they crossed that stream and short- 
ly afterward came to the head of Lake Tahoe. 
Proceeding down the east side of this lake, they 
found a band of Indians, who appeared to be 
greatly excited at seeing the white men. After 
showing the Indians a few specimens of gold, 
the Americans told the red men that they would 
give them some blankets in payment if they 
would guide the party to the famous gold fields. 
But the Indians did not seem to understand their 
visitors; so, after a short delay, our fortune-seek- 
ers went onward. At the head of Long Canyon, 
near Lake Tahoe, they discovered some small 
"prospects/' but the place did not appear rich 
enough to warrant their making an extended 
investigation. 

. The party left the neighborhood of Lake Tahoe 
at night, the band of Indians following them at a 
distance. Summerfield and his friends stopped 
to camp; and early the next morning, food being 
scarce, some of the men arose and went out to 
hunt for deer. The others remained in bed un- 
til late in the forenoon. Later, when they went 
out to attend to their stock they found two or 
three ropes still tied to the trees, while four of 
their animals had disappeared. 

Attempting to follow the tracks of the Indian 
thieves, our friends found themselves entangled 
in a rough and dangerous forest, and, concluding 



JAMES W. SUMMERFIELD. 153 

that four men stood very little chance against a 
gang of Indians in that wild country, they wend- 
ed their way back to camp and shortly after- 
ward started over the hills to Georgetown. They 
had begun their journey, full of hope and con- 
fidence; they had come back, disappointed, yet 
rich in experience. The location of the fabu- 
lous "Gold Lake" still remains a mystery. 

During the season following that fruitless 
journey Summerfield worked at mining in the 
neighborhood of Georgetown, Kelsey and Mos- 
quito Canyon. 

Placer mining in Hangtown began March 1, 
1849, with the discovery, by several Oregonians, 
of a rich spot in Hangtown creek, near the mouth 
of Cedar Ravine. This ravine is said to have 
yielded about $1,000,000 in gold. The next dis- 
covery was in Log Cabin Ravine — now Bedford 
Avenue — first worked by the Winslow brothers. 
About $250,000 was taken out of that neigh- 
borhood. The richest portion of the creek was 
between a point below the mouth of Cedar Ra- 
vine and a place near the foundry. Below this 
very little gold was discovered. In ascending the 
creek, good wages were made above Cedar Ra- 
vine as far as Dr. Price's store, but very little 
was found beyond there. Spots in the creek, 
especially in the rear of the Court House, were 
exceedingly rich, and a piece of ground in the 
rear of Adams' Hotel— afterwards the Mountjoy 
House — was worked in 1849 and until the fol- 
lowing spring by Fish Brothers & Co., who real- 
ized about $20,000. 

Just below Adams' Hotel was a round tent 
used by Tom Ashton during the winter of 1849 
as a saloon and gambling-house. In the rear of 



154 FIONEERS OF EL DuRADO. 

this tent, a man named Wiley washed out, dur- 
ing the spring of 1850, the sum of $1400 from 
one pan of white clay. It was learned by invest- 
igation afterward that the channel of the creek had 
formerly extended where this clay was found, 
and that the bed of the creek had extended along 
that side of the creek as far as the Cary House. 
All of that ground was immensely rich. The 
amount of gold taken from this portion of the 
creek and the flat below aggregated about $800,- 
000. The majority of the pioneers agree that 
very little gold was to be found in Main street, 
except perhaps a narrow spot on the Piaza, 
where the old creek had run across. 

Emigrant Ravine paid fair wages. Going north 
from town to Big Canyon, Poverty Point and the 
vicinity, many valuable ravines were discovered; 
but the richest deposits, considering the extent 
of ground worked, was the celebrated Red Hill, 
a decomposed quartz deposit lead, found upon 
the apex of a slate ledge crossing three different 
ravines, and running toward Big Canyon. This 
lead was perhaps one-eighth of a mile \om and 
in some places only about three inches wide; yet 
more than $250,000 was taken from it. Still, 
Oregon Ravine, which has already been men- 
tioned, had, up to 1851— produced more gold 
than any other ravine near Placerville — Hang- 
town— yielding $1,000,000. 

Near the mouth of Spanish Ravine was found 
a rich lead which, however, was worked out in 
the summer of 1849. A small ravine near the 
Emigrant Road, close to Smith's Flat, produced 
about $13,000; and during the winter of 1849, 
$64,000 was taken by four men from a little ra- 
vine near Newtown. 



JAMES W. SUMMERFIELD. 15£ 

Weber creek, on the south, for about four 
miles was very rich, as were also many of the 
smaller ravines opening into it. From George- 
town Canyon, on the north side of the county, 
it is estimated that fully $2,000,000 were taken 
up to 1853. 

One portion of White Rock Canyon, worked 
during the winter of 1849-50 by O'Brien, Gray- 
son, Stuart and Dayton, proved of great value. 
The South Fork of the American river, and the 
bars along it, were not noted for their paying 
qualities, although some rich spots were discov- 
ered. Kanaka Bar, for example, yielded thou- 
sands of dollars; one nugget was found there 
which was alone worth $1,010. But the richest 
bar upon the river belonged to Portuguese Joe, 
who realized a fortune from his claim. 

The first hill diggings in El Dorado county 
were discovered near Upper Placerville, early in 
the spring of 1851, by the Aiken brothers, who 
worked a small ravine located on the side of In- 
dian Hill. At the upper end of the ravine the 
"pay dirt" gave out, and instead of a slate bed- 
rock, they found what appeared to be of the na- 
ture of sandstone. Upon examination, however, 
this proved to be cement, under which, upon 
working through it, they found a deposit of rich 
gravel resting upon a slate foundation and pitch- 
ing into the hill. Other hills in the vicinity were 
discovered to be similar in character, being 
cement-capped and containing ancient river-beds 
rich in gold. 

Quartz mining was not begun until 1853, and 
it has been followed, with varying success, up 
to the present time. 

The following bill of fare indicates that all the 



156 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

profits of the early-day mining did not go into the 
pockets of the miners: 

EL DORADO HOTEL, 
Hangtown, January, 1850. 

M. ELSTNER, Proprietor 

Soup. 

Bean $1.00 

Ox-tail (short) 1.50 

Roast. 

Beef, wild, (prime cut) 1.50 

" , up along, 1.00 

" , a la mode (plain) 1.00 

" , with one potato (fair size) 1.25 

" , tame, from Arkansas 1.50 

Vegetables. 

Baked Beans, plain 75 

" " , greased 1.00 

Two potatoes (medium size) 50 

(peeled) 75 

Entrees. 

Sauer Kraut 1.00 

Bacon, fried '. 1.00 

" , stuffed 1.5a 

Hash, low grade .75 

" , 18 carats 1.00 

Game. 

Cod Fish Balls, per pair....... 75 

Grizzly, Roast 1.00 

Fried 1.00 

Jack Rabbit (whole) 1.50 

Pastry. 
Rice Pudding, Plain 75 



JAMES W. SUMMERFIELD. 15 

Rice " , with molasses 1.00 

Rice Pudding, with Brandy Peaches 2.00 

Square Meal, with dessert 3.00 

Payable in Advance. 
Gold scales on the end of Bar. 

Among the miners who were working along 
Hangtown creek during 1853-4, was along, gaunt 
Alabaman to whom his neighbors had given the 
nickname of "Long Hungry." He claimed to be 
a "Hard-shell" Baptist, but he possessed an 
ugly temper and was very domineering to his 
physical inferiors; yet he was careful never to 
molest his equals or superiors in muscle. He 
was very ignorant and could read only by spell- 
ing each word as he went along; and he was un- 
able to write himself or to read the penmanship 
of others. On Sundays, as a religious duty, he 
always tried to study the Bible. 

Up the creek, a short distance from the claim 
of the Alabaman and his partners, were three 
Germans who spoke English very brokenly. All 
three were Catholics and they always refused to 
work Sundays. It was necessary to economize 
with the water, so that each miner below them 
on the creek would have sufficient water for his 
work. By using sacks filled with dirt, the Ger- 
mans had made a dam to turn the water into 
their sluices. Occasionally the dam leaked, but 
the Germans were very careful, and whenever 
they were notified of a leak they would prompt- 
ly stop it. 

But the Southerner was prejudiced against the 
Germans on account of their religion. 

"Dog-gone heathen ought to be druvoutuvthe 
countryl" he would exclaim. "If I went into 
their country they'd burn me at the stake. I. 



158 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

know it; read about it in books; seed pictures uv 
'em! I's goin' to whip 'em!" 

One day it was noticed that the Alabaman had 
moved his sluices. He said he "didn't care about 
water." The next morning the Germans' dam 
was badly torn, and the Southerner's partners 
accused him of being the transgressor, He ad- 
mitted his guilt. 

Two of the men helped the Germans to repair 
their dam. At noon the next day the Southerner 
found, tacked to one side of his sluices, a written 
paper. He at once brought it to his partners, 
saying, 

"Whut's this dog-gone thing?" 

One of the men took the paper and after pre- 
tending: to read it, said gravely, 

1 'God! I'm sorry for you— mighty sorry! I 
warned you. You've got it at last!"— The men 
themselves had prepared the paper as a hoax, to 
make the Alabaman believe that he had to ap- 
pear before the Alcalde for punishment. — 

The Southerner was stupefied. The others 
made a pretense of trying to console him. He 
finally said, 

"Tear the dog-gone thing up; throw it in the 
sluices!" 

The man with the paper shook his head. 

"Can't do that, you know. Its one of those 
law papers. You must appear," 

But the Southerner positively refused to go. 

His tormentor insisted that it was necessary 
for him to appear "forthwith," whereat the 
Southerner demanded what he meant by that 
word. 

"Forthwith? It means between now and to- 
morrow morning." 






JAMES W. SUMMERFIELD. 159 

The Southerner was in despair. At last he 
concluded that he would sell out his share of the 
claim and run away, as he could see no other 
way out of the difficulty. That was precisely 
whit his partners wanted. They closer) the bar- 
gain immediately and the Alabaman left during the 
night. 

The next day one of the Germans who knew 
of the trick came down, grinning, 

"Appeared he didn't got much happiness," he 
said. 

During the winter of 1852 James Summerfield 
worked in Spanish Fiat. That winter small-pox 
broke out in camp and four deaths occurred. 
Summerfield was taken sick, but, having been 
vaccinated, he had only a light form of the dis- 
ease. A pair of blankets from the bed of Green, 
a young man who had died of the malady, was 
hung out to be aired, and was stolen during the 
night. A few days later a Spaniard in a canyon a 
few miles away fell a victim to the dread disease. 
The inference was not difficult to follow. 

In 1860 James VV. Summerfield bought a large 
tract of land at Mosquito and thereafter devoted 
his time to farming. Recently, failing health 
caused him to give up the work and he moved 
to Placerville, where he still lives with the fam- 
ily of his son-in-law, County Clerk John P, 
Fisher. His son, Clark Summerfield, and family, 
are now managing the place where the father 
spent so many fruitful years. 



XIII. 



G. J. CARPENTER, 



PIONEER LAWYER AND EDITOR. 



G.J. Carpenter was born in Hartford, Susquehan- 
na county, Pennsylvania, May 4, 1823. His first 
American ancestors, on the paternal side, arrived 
in Massachusetts Bay Colony during 1636; his 
maternal ancestors, the Thayers, reached the 
same colony two years afterward. His grand- 
parents were among the pioneers of his native 
town, and here Asahel Carpenter and Amanda 
Malvina Thayer were married May 25, 1822. 
They had one daughter — who died in childhood 
— and five sons: Gideon Judd, Frederick, Cyrus 
Clay, John and Emmett. 



G. J. CARPENTER. 161 

One of the brothers. Colonel C. C. Carpenter, 
settled in Iowa. During a part of the Civil War 
he served on the staff of General Dodge, and he 
was filling a similar office under General Logan 
in Sherman's march to the sea. Returning to 
Iowa, he was twice elected governor of that 
state and twice a representative in Congress, 
On the maternal side of his family, our pioneer, 
G. J. Carpenter, was related to William H. Seward. 

* "In 1835 his father moved in a two-horse 
wagon, over corduroy roads, to Warren county, 
Indiana. Here, while his father followed land- 
surveying, he worked on a little backwoods farm, 
in sight of the Wabash river. At the end of six 
years, saddened by the loss of his mother and 
his brother John, the rest of the family returned 
to Hartford, where two years later his father and 
sister died. Again among friends and relatives 
who were the founders of Franklin Academy, he 
was at intervals for eight years, a student at that 
institution. During his academic term he was a 
fellow student of J. H. McKune and Amos 
Adams, before whom, as district judges of Cali- 
fornia, he afterward practiced. His reading of 
law under a retired professor was suspended in 
1849, when he again determined to try his for- 
tunes in the West. This time Chicago was his 
objective point, but California was his unforeseen 
destination. With his three comrades and a 
good outfit, he spent the summer of 1850 on the 
plains with the overland pioneers of that year; 
and a few days before the admission of Cali- 
fornia into the Union he pitched his tent under 
the tall pines which then overshadowed George- 

*fffom "Ripre*ent«tiT«Citizens of Northern California." 



162 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

town, minus pretty much all the rest of his out- 
fit. 

'The end of a long and tiresome journey was 
the beginning of his life work in the paradise of 
miners, where every disappointment had in it 
the pleasures of hope ani golden visions of for- 
tunes yet to be made. The next five years, ex- 
cepting only the summer of 1854, he devoted all 
h\s energies to placer and river mining. Begin- 
ning at Greenwood, his mining career ended at 
Big Bar, on the Middle Fork of the American 
River, where he organized and engineered the 
most daring and expensive fluming operation 
ever undertaken on that river. By a flume over 
two miles in length, fifteen feet wide and four 
feet deep, the river from Volcano to Big Bar was 
completely drained and made to run the wheels 
and pumps by which it was done. Eye-wit- 
nesses of this achievement, and of his discovery 
and operations on the Big Crevice at Big Bar, are 
still living in Placerville. When he left the 
mines for other occupations, he owed nothing, 
and but for the festivities of a miner's life in the 
'50's, they would have been largely indebted to 
him." 

r::In i860 G. J. Carpenter canvassed and voted 
for Stephen A, Douglas. In 1862, Carpenter 
himself, an ardent Union Democrat, was elected 
County Clerk of El Dorado county. Two years 
later he canvassed and voted for Lincoln, whose 
administration he uncompromisingly supported 
until the close of the Civil War, when he re- 
turned to his old love, "Jeffersonian Democracy." 
In 1867, as candidate on the Democratic ticket, 
-he was elected District Attorney of El Dorado 
county, an office to which he was twice re-elect- 



G. J. CARPENTER. 163 

ed. Three months before the expiration of the 
third term he resigned his office in order that he 
might take up the duties of Assemblyman, to 
which position his party had elected him. He 
became Speaker of the Assembly. In 1878 he 
was appointed by Governor Irwin to the office 
of Supreme Court reporter. The salary of this 
office having been reduced from six thousand 
to two thousand dollars dollars annually, he 
gave up the place at the end of two years. 

In 1857 G. J. Carpenter was married to Miss 
Mary A. Whitney of Wheelock, Vermont. Of 
their three children, Prentiss, Galusha and Mol- 
lie, Galusha and Mollie still are living. Prentiss, 
the gifted elder son, died November 27, 1902; 
shortly after his election, on the Democratic 
ticket, to the Superior Judgeship of El Dorado 
county. Prentiss had previously served two 
terms as District Attorney. His untimely death 
was a blow from which his parents have never 
recovered. 

In 1889 G. J. Carpenter and George E. Will- 
iams became joint owners of "The Mountain 
Democrat," the pioneer newspaper of til Dorado 
county. Two years later Mr. Carpenter became 
sole owner of the paper which has had so long; 
and successful a career. On December 27, 1902, 
Mr. Carpenter transferred, as a gift to his daugh- 
ter, Miss Mollie Carpenter, the plant and business 
of 'The Mountain Democrat;" but while his 
daughter's name stands at the head of the paper's 
editorial columns, the well-known forcible diction 
of Mr. Carpenter himself is frequently recog- 
nized in the articles which appear in the issues 
of the journal. 

The history of any newspaper must needs be 



164 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

composed largely of the annals of the town and 
county it represents. 

We now come to a murder case which is 
notable mainly for its highly sensational features 
and for the fact that its consummation resulted 
in the last legal execution held in El Dorado 
county, the Legislature having passed a bill pro- 
viding that all such punishments should in the 
future take place in one of the State Prisons. 
The "El Dorado Republican" of September 13, 
1888, gives the following resume of the case: 

"The body of John Lowell was found partially 
decayed and concealed in the cellar of a burned 
building on his ranch near Mormon Island on 
June 2. The skull was fractured and the cir- 
cumstances indicated murder. Some valuable 
horses and a buggy were missing from the place, 
and these were found in the neighborhood of 
Sacramento, where it was ascertained that they 
had been sold by Myers, Olsen and Drager under 
assumed names. They were arrested — Drager 
in the city, Olsen on a ranch a short distance 
away, and Myers at Tehachipi, his address being 
obtained from John Stein, a saloon-keeper of 
Sacramento implicated in the sale of the horses 
and suspected of being engaged in the plot to 
kill Lowell. 

"The men all showed a strong desire to talk of 
the crime, and all made voluntary statements. 
These statements agree in the story that they 
left Stein's saloon together about the 21st of 
March in a wagon, with one horse and two guns, 
and went by a circuitous route to the neighbor- 
hood of Lowell's ranch, where they arrived on 
the evening of the third day, and returned 
toward Sacramento on the night of the fourth 



G. J. C1RPENTER. 16S 

day with the horses. 

"Myers. at first stated that Lowell and them- 
selves went out on the ranch the next morning 
after their arrival to look at timber, and when 
they returned he shot Lowell in the neck from 
behind with his shot-gun, and that Drager then 
struck him with a sledge hammer. Myers after- 
wards changed this statement by saying that 
Olsen first shot Lowell with a pistol and that his 
gun went off accidentally as he removed it from 
his shoulder. 

"Olsen's story was that he was walking be- 
hind Lowell, and Myers was behind him. When 
Myers fired, he was frightened and ran into the 
chicken-house. He says he was compelled by 
threats to assist in the removal of the body, and 
that in anger at his non-assistance, Myers broke 
the gun on the wagon-wheel. 

"Drager at first said they had camped near the 
ranch, and that the other two were absent and 
returned with the stock, when they all took it: 
to Sacramento; but at the examination in Placer- 
ville, he stated that he was present at the shoot- 
ing, and that Myers fired at Lowell twice, and 
then broke the gun over his head and threw it 
into the well, where it was subsequently found. 
His final statement agreed with that of the 
others concerning the concealment of the body 
in the house and the subsequent burial in the old; 
cellar." 

The trial of the three accused men began in 
Placerville on August 28, 1888, G. J. Carpenter, 
G. G. Blanchard and C. F. Irwin representing the 
defendants, and District Attorney M. P. Bennett 
appearing for the people. The following citizens 
were selected as jurors: J. A. Wolf, Michael 



166 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO, . 

Martin, Jacob W. Behm, Conrad F. Buiff, Fred- 
erick Rohlfing, J. W. Roelke, Thomas Ralph,, 
Emil Larsen, Joseph H. Maynard, Louis Rieber, 
Jr., George Askew and Thomas Worth. 

At 10 o'clock on Saturday evening, September 
8, Judge George E. Williams read his charge to 
the jury, and they retired to deliberate. It was 2 
o'clock the next morning before they returned to 
the court-room, and their foreman read, in a low 
tone, that the defendants had been found "guilty, 
as charged/' 

There was a stay of sentence, but on October 
2 Judge Williams sentenced Myers, Olsen and 
Drager to be hanged Friday, November 30. In 
the matter of Olsen and Drager there was a stay 
of execution; but Myers died on the scaffold on 
the appointed day, and he remained to the end a 
cowardly, contemptible villain. 

A petition for the commutation of the death 
sentence in the cases of Olsen and Drager was 
signed by a large number of people, including 
Judge Arnot— presiding during the absence of 
Judge Williams— ex-District Attorney Bennett, 
District Attorney Ingham and Sheriff Anderson. 
The petition stated, among other things, that it 
was the general feeling that Olsen and Drager 
had become involved in the murder, not by de- 
liberate intention to kill, but by their stupidity 
and a certain recklessness and brutality acquired 
from their life as sailors, which led them to fol- 
low Myers into the crime. 

But the Governor refused to interfere in the 
case, and the two men suffered the extreme pen- 
alty on October 11, 1889, going to their deaths 
bravely, in direct contrast to their former com- 
panion, Myers. To this day many persons be- 



G. J. CARPENTER. 167 

Heve that Olsen and Drager did not deserve so 
hard a fate. 

On the sixth of November, 1897, there occurred 
an event which is unique in El Dorado county's 
history. For two or three days previous to that 
date a heavy valley fog had been hanging over 
the foot-hills. On Saturday afternoon, suddenly 
a driving hail-storm descended, and accompany- 
ing the hail was a vast, whirling black cloud 
which even the uninitiated recognized as a torna- 
do, often wrongly called a "cyclone." Its genera 
#1 direction was from the northwest. On the 
Crawford place, between Granite Hill and Colo- 
ma, the house was twisted off its foundation and 
badly wrecked; the barn and outhouses were 
demolished; while a large live-oak tree, two feet 
in diameter, was torn up by the roots, and a pine 
tree near by was broken in twain. Between the 
Crawford place and Granite Hill many large trees 
*were uprooted. At B. and L. Veerkamp's farm 
in Granite Hill the barn was wrecked and a por- 
tion of the house wrenched out of shape. A 
little farther on the Gold Hill school-house was 
lifted from the floor and torn into fragments, the 
desks were mostly destroyed, the library scat- 
tered and the stove demolished; but the organ 
was picked up by the freakish wind and gently 
deposited upon the ground without even injuring 
a pedal. Passing on to Cold Springs, the storm 
unroofed Mr. Mull's house and woodshed, and 
beyond, at John Ryan's place, it twisted one end 
of the barn out of shape. From there the torna- 
do went eastward, along Weber creek, uprooted 
a large number of Victor Rowland's fruit trees, 
wrecking the barn on the Reed place, opposite, 
and damaged the house so badly that the family 



168 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

had to move out the next day. It struck the 
Weber creek wagon-road bridge and carried 
away a part of the roof just as Sheriff George 
Hilbert and Jack Doyle were driving upon that 
structure in order to escape the hail- storm, caus- 
ing the horses to run away, but with little dam- 
age to the buggy and none to its occupants. The 
last heard of this unusual storm was at the 
Griffith Mine, above Diamond Springs, where it 
did some damage to the buildings. The storm 
was from one hundred yards to one-fourth of a 
mile in width. The property loss resulting from 
its havoc was about $10,000. 

On Admission Day, September 9, 1898, Placer- 
ville Parloi, No, 9, Native Sons of the Golden 
West, held a very successful celebration in Pla- 
cerville in commemoration of the Fiftieth Anni- 
versary of Marshall's discovery of gold at Co- 
loma, January 24, 1848. 

Monday morning, July 27, 1903, the residents 
of Placerville were electrified by the news that 
fourteen desperate convicts had escaped from the 
State Prison at Folsom at about 6.45 o'clock that 
morning, and were on their way to El Dorado 
county. That was the first news; later the par- 
ticulars of the event were learned. 

The inmates of the prison, having eaten break- 
fast, were marching in line from the dining-room 
past the captain's office where Warden Wilkin- 
son, Captain Murphy and other officers had as- 
sembled to inspect the prisoners. Several men 
abruptly left the ranks, and, with razors and 
knives as weapons, attacked the prison officials. 
They evidently intended to capture the officers 
"instead of killing them, for the warden's clothing 
was merely slashed with a razor. C J. Coth- 



G. J. CARPENTER. 169 

rane, the prison turnkey, entered the office and 
struck at the convicts with a cane, whereupon 
one of them stabbed him in the back. William 
L Cotter and W. C. Chalmers, two guards, were 
slashed with razors, one in the abdomen, the 
other on the hands. Cotter afterward died. 
Guard Jolly was also wounded. 

In this manner the convicts captured Warden 
Wilkinson and several lesser officials, and also 
young Harry Wilkinson, the Warden's grandson. 
The convicts then proceeded into the yard, 
using their prisoners as shields, with the result 
that the guards in the towers on the hill of the 
prison grounds were afraid to turn on the Gat- 
ling guns lest some of the officials should be 
killed. 

The convicts seized a guard at the armory, 
took the keys, and, entering the armory, took 
what weapons they wanted, and left the grounds, 
going toward the Mormon Inland bridge and 
taking the guards with them. 

Following are the names of the escaped pris- 
oners, their homes, terms and crimes: 

Mike Miller of Fresno, serving twelve years 
for burglary; H. Eldridge, Alameda county, thirty 
years, burglary; J. Theron. San Francisco, life 
imprisonment, robbery; Fred Howard, Sacra- 
mento, fifteen years, robbery; J. H. Wood, San 
Francisco, for life, robbery; E. Davis, San Fran- 
cisco, thirty-three years, robbery; J. J. Allison, 
San Joaquin county, four years, robbery; J. Mur- 
phy, Contra Costa county, fourteen years, big- 
amy; A. Seevis, Sacramento, twenty-five years, 
burglary; J. Roberts, San Francisco, twenty 
years, robbery; R. M. Gordon, Sacramento, forty- 
five years, robbery; R. Fahey, Sacramento, for 



170 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO, 

life, robbery — third term; S. J. Case, Los An- 
geles, robbery — third term. 

A short distance from the prison grounds the 
convicts released the Warden after taking his 
hat. The Captain was next allowed to go with- 
out his trousers. With several of the minor 
officials still in their clutches, the convicts started 
in the direction of Pilot Hill, El Dorado county. 
Seizing a four-horse wagon on the road, they 
compelled the owner to drive them wherever 
they wanted to go. Reaching Pilot Hill about 
three o'clock in the afternoon, they helped them- 
selves to whatever they wanted from the store 
of S. D. Diehl. But they remained too long. At 
five o'clock the Sheriffs' posses from Placer and 
Sacramento counties arrived on the scene. 
These men, forty-two in number, surrounded 
the place, and as the convicts' party were get- 
ting into the wagon seventy or eighty shots 
were exchanged, and one of the convicts, Alli- 
son, was so badly wounded that he afterward 
shot himself. Shortly after this, after escaping 
from the posses, the convicts released their cap- 
tives, and it is supposed that they themselves 
separated into small parties, each going a differ- 
ent direction. 

Company H of Placerville, belonging to the 
National Guard of California, was ordered out, 
first going to Folsom, thence to the north side of 
El Dorado county, where the convicts had first 
gone. 

Various disquieting and conflicting rumors 
were heard during the arduous man-hunt which 
followed. On Friday, July 31, Company H and 
the men of Sheriff A. S. Bosquit's posse returned 
to Placerville after a fruitless search over the 



G. J. CARPENTER. 171 

hills in the vicinity of Lotus. Toward noon on 
Saturday, August 1, a message was brought to 
the Sheriff's office by Mrs. George Cozzens, 
from the neighborhood of Hank's Exchange, to 
the effect that Fred Twitcheil, a boy of eleven 
years, who was picking apples in the orchard of 
his grandfather, Supervisor W. W. Hoyt, had 
seen five men who resembled convicts. They 
had come upon him suddenly in the orchard and 
had gone up the bed of Squaw creek. They 
were beardless, four of them carried guns, and 
the other had a sack or bundle. The boy had 
told Mr. Hoyt, who, upon examining the tracks 
of the men, saw that where the pedestrians had 
crossed the dusty road they had first walked on 
their heels, and then jumped, for the purpose of 
concealing their trail. Mrs. Cozzens was com- 
ing to Placerville, so word was sent by her to 
Sheriff Bosquit. 

A posse was gotten ready without delay. In 
the meantime another message came. David 
Gipe, living at the Grand Victory mine, near 
Hoyt's place, sent word that two men had come 
to his house about noon and bought four dozen 
eggs and some bread, and also got salt and 
matches. While these two men were at the 
house, three others stood on the mine dump some 
distance off and watched proceedings, afterward 
joining the first two when they left the house. 

Later, Andrew Kamenzind, who lived in a cab- 
in at the head of Mathenas creek above Diamond 
Springs, sent a message. Five armed men had 
come out of the woods early that morning, ob- 
tained breakfast of him and then disappeared. 

But some time before these later messages 
came, two parties had set off in pursuit of the 



172 .PIONEERS OF EL DuRADO, 

supposed convicts. One comprised a body of 
deputy sheriffs headed by Dallas Bosquit and 
went by way of Texas Hill, This posse was 
composed of William Krumpe, T. H. Allen, P. A. 
Young, J. E. Sexton, and C. E. Peters. The other 
party went through Coon Hollow, and were vol- 
unteers from Company H, led by Lieutenant 
Thomas Smith, and consisting of Will Rutherford, 
Festus Rutherford, W. G, Jones, Henry Walters, 
Albert Gill, W. C. Burgess and A. T. Bell. 

The military boys proceeded to the Grand Vic- 
tory mine, about five miles southeast of Placer- 
ville, and commenced to trail the convicts where 
they had left traces after going from Gipe's 
house, which was near by. 

In this neighborhood are two hills perhaps 
two hundred feet high, and partially separated 
by a ravine. Four or five acres of ground on the 
summits of these hills are covered with a growth 
of manzanita bushes, so dense that a man must 
crawl to get through them. 

Traces were found leading into this thicket of 
brush, but considerable search was made with- 
out bringing any further results. The men 
passed around the bushy tract in hopes of find- 
ing a trail leading away from it. Seeing none, 
they concluded to make a thorough examination 
of the hill. After going over portions of it, six 
men — Will and Festus Rutherford, W. G. Jones, 
A. T, Bell, W. C. Burgess and A. Gill— started to 
cross the summits with the intention of coming 
down through the ravine afterward. At about 
4:30 o^clock, they were alternately walking and 
crawling upward through the manzanitas. As 
they neared the summits, one of the party— said 
to be Bell— caught sight of the convicts in the 



G. J. CARPENTER. 17$ 

bushes and exclaimed, 

''There they are, boys!" 

The words were hardly uttered before a leaden- 
volley came hurtling around them. Jones in- 
stantly pitched forward and lay still. Festus 
Rutherford fired several shots, then he, too, fell 
heavily. A. Gill was shot in the right shoulder, 
but, dropping behind a log, he kept firing into 
the brush. He said that he saw Jones and 
Rutherford fall before he was driven back down 
the hill. 

Bell, Burgess and Will Rutherford escaped in- 
jury, possibly because they were not in a direct 
line with the convicts' volley. After the first 
discharge the smoke and bushes together served 
to hide the criminals, and, although the men 
fired rapidly, their aim was necessarily inaccurate. 

Henry Walters and J. A. Biggs were immedi- 
atelp despatched to Placerville for a surgeon and 
reinforcements. They arrived between six and 
seven o'clock, bringing the news that the men. 
were wounded; for at the time they did not know 
that Festus Rutherford and Jones were killed, 
and A. Gill had been so excited during the skir- 
mish that he did not seem to realize that he 
himself was wounded. 

The town was thrown at once into a furore of 
excitement. Women and children wept, angry 
men rushed for firearms, and in a very few 
minutes vehicles crowded to their utmost capac- 
ity were clattering over the hills toward the 
scene of conflict. So great was the desire for 
vengeance upon the outlaws that it was impos- 
sible to find wagons enough in town to convey- 
all the men who wanted to go. Doctors Wrenn y 
Mountain and Kellogg went along to attend to the 



174 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

injured. By daylight more than one hundred 
armed men had encircled the thicket where the 
convicts were supposed to be in hiding. 

Nothing could be seen of Festus Rutherford 
and Jones, who, so far as known, were still lying 
where they fell, within twenty feet of the con- 
victs. Some of the men wanted to storm the hill 
that night, but the plan was discouraged as being 
an unnecessary risk of life. 

During the vigil around the hillside a most un- 
fortunate event happened. Philip Springer, 
whose home was in the neighborhood, took his 
gun and joined the guards on the picket line 
with the expectation of aiding them. But, in- 
stead of remaining in one place, he kept moving 
over the grounds. Just before ten o'clock he 
was challenged in the darkness by one of the 
guards. Being partly deaf, it is supposed that 
he did not hear, for he failed to answer the 
challenge, but continued to move about. Shots 
were fired and the hapless man fell dead, a bul- 
let having entered his back and come out through 
the chest. 

At daylight Will Rutherford organized a party 
of twelve or fourteen to mount the hill and re- 
cover the bodies of his brother and young Jones. 
The men advanced cautiously, supposing that 
the convicts were still in ambush. But soon 
they were sadly undeceived; their own little 
squad were all that were living on that rugged 
hill-top. A member of Company H suddenly 
discovered the familiar khaki uniform. Griffith 
Jones lay on his rifle, his head shattered and 
two bullet holes through his body. He had 
been bending forward, examining the ground for 
signs of convicts, when the first bullet struck 



G. J. CARPENTER. 17S 

him and had probably died without suffering, for 
his head was shattered by the ball. 

Festus Rutherford, still a boy under nineteen 
years, lay outstretched near his rifle and several 
empty shells, a bullet wound through his throat 
and right shoulder and another piercing his chest 
and coming out under his right arm-pit. There 
was nothing to indicate that the bodies had been 
disturbed after the fatal shots were fired. 

About fourteen feet away was the convict 
camp, deserted. The outlaws had evidently es- 
caped in the confusion which followed the shoot- 
ing, quitting the hill on the opposite side from 
where the bodies lay. There was every indica- 
tion of a hasty departure. Three large revolvers, 
a coat, some vests, several hats — one having a 
bullet hole in its brim— and the field-glasses 
stolen from Diehfs store at Pilot Hill, were found 
in the convicts' late camp. There were also a 
large can of water and several smaller cans, and 
the ground was strewn with 45-70 cartridge 
shells. Nothing was there to indicate that any 
convict had been killed or even wounded. 

Tenderly, sadly, did the men carry from the 
thicket the bodies of the brave young soldiers,, 
the innocent victims of a prison official's incom- 
petence. 

After the recovery of the bodies the hill was- 
fired, but without avail. The convicts were evi- 
dently miles away. 

A few of the outlaws were afterward captured 
and two of them paid the extreme penalty of the 
law. Theron, the ringleader, and some others, 
are still at large. But only two were caught who- 
participated in the shooting at Manzanita Hill. 
John H. Wood, deserter from the American army 



176 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

in the Philippines and several times a murderer 
and a robber, was captured in Reno, Nevada, 
August 24, 1903. returned to California, and on 
December 31, 1903, was, together with Joseph 
Murphy, indicted by the Grand Jury of El Dorado 
county for the murder of J. Festus Rutherford. 
The trial of John H. Wood began in the Superior 
Court of El Dorado county February 23, 1904, 
the people being represented by District Attorney 
Peters, A. M. Seymour and Clarke Howard, and 
the defendant first by J. P. G. Miller and later by 
W. F. Bray. The trial closed on the 16th of 
March, Wood being found guilty of murder in the 
first degree. His counsel appealed to ths Su- 
preme Court, but that body sustained the verdict 
of the lower court. On January 31, 1905, three 
days before he was to have been taken to Pla- 
cerville to be re-sentenced, John H. Wood com- 
mitted suicide in his cell at the State Prison in 
Folsom by hanging himself with a rope made of 
strips torn from his pillow cover. 

Joseph Murphy, another of the convicts who 
was at Manzanita Hill, was tried in Sacramento, 
found guilty of the murder of Guard Cotter of 
the Folsom prison, and notwithstanding that his 
attorneys did all in their power to save him, he 
expiated his crime on the scaffold, July 14, 190.5. 

On Tuesday, August 4, 1903, the bodies of J. 
Festus Rutherford and W. G. Jones, the soldier 
lads who had met so untimely a death, were 
buried in the Union Cemetery with full military 
--honors; and to-day a suitable monument com- 
memorates their heroic sacrifice and marks their 
quiet resting-place in the beautiful city of the 
dead. Upon the stone, also, is carved the name 
of George Williams, another member of Com- 



G. J. CARPENTER. 177 

pany H, a faithful and manly young soldier, who 
died of typhoid fever in the spring of 1904 and 
who is again communing with the other depart- 
ed comrades whom he loved so well upon earth. 
Thus young and old, native son and pioneer, 
fall before the world-conqueror. Of the builders 
of our state, those sturdy men of the "days of 
gold," there remain but a scattered few. 
Among them none looks more hopefully toward 
the future than does the veteran lawyer and ed- 
itor, G. J. Carpenter. 



CONCLUSION. 



'Touch me gently, friend of mine; 

I'm all that's left of '49. 

Many a long-forgotten face 

Hath watched me in my good old place, 

Many a heart, once true and warm, 

Hath watched through me the threatened storm* 

A moral on my face is cast 

Which all must truly learn at last: 

Man's hopes and fears are all, alas! 

Like me, a fractured pane of glass." 

These lines, written by William Frank Stewart 
upon a pane of glass set in the first log cabin 



CONCLUSION. 179 

built in Placerville— erected in 1848 by Benja- 
min F. Post — ^fittingly illustrate the passing of 
all that was temporal of the pioneer days. But 
the spirit of '49, that intangible human quality 
which has alone made the greatness of our 
commonwealth, yet remains. 

Following the decadence of mining in the sev- 
enties, those other and abiding industries of 
fruit-raising and dairying began to assume a 
prominent place in El Dorado county's activities. 
Her mines were but temporary at best; but her 
fertile soils and matchless climate were inex- 
haustible. 

Early on the 18th day of April, 1906, the wires 
flashed the startling news that San Francisco, 
California's metropolis, had been partially de- 
stroyed and afterward set afire by an earthquake 
which had struck the city at 5.16 o'clock that 
morning. 

In the trying days which followed Placerville 
and El Dorado county did their full share to suc- 
cor and comfort the hapless thousands of the 
stricken city. 

Hardly had the embers cooled among its 
smoking ruins when the people, undismayed by 
the awful calamity which had laid the works of 
half a century in ruins, began clearing away the 
debris in readiness for the rebuilding of that 
vastly greater and more beautiful city which they 
knew must arise along the shores of that mag- 
nificent bay. 

* This cabin stood on lower Main street, opposite Morey's 
foundry, on what is known to-day as the "old Fred Hoffmeister 
place, " now owned by H. C. Marsh. It was torn down during- 
the Eighties by F. Hoffmeister, Sr. The lines quoted were writ- 
ten on the pane of glass April 19, 1865, the day of President Lin- 
coln's funeral. 



180 CONCLUSION. 

And the indomitable will and confidence which 
is causing San Francisco to spring again from its 
ashes is likewise slowly but steadily fitting El 
Dorado, the old " Empire County/' for a career 
of happiness and prosperity which may even 
exceed the Utopian dreams of the fathers and 
mothers who braved the dangers and the hard- 
ships which ever beset the pathway of him who; 
ventures into new and untried fields. 



The End. 



APPENDIX. 
JOAQUIN MURIETA*, THE BANDIT. 



Joaquin Murieta's life is not actually apart of El Dorado 
county's history. Despite the assertions of a few pioneers to< 
the contrary, none of the depredations of that notorious outlaw 
were committed in El Dorado county; nor can any record be 
found of his ever having- visited the county. His field of oper- 
ations lay principally in that portion of the state immediately 
south of El Dorado, and in toward the southwest, particularly 
in the county of San Joaquin. Still, the residents of our 
county in the days of Murieta's career lived in constant dread 
of invasions by his band of cutthroats, and for that reason a 
sketch of his life will doubtless be a most acceptable addition 
to this book. 

Joaquin Murieta was a Mexican of good family and was 
born in the province of Sonora. He received a common-school 
education in his native country. In those days he was re- 
markable for a very mild, peaceable and generous disposition,. 

* Pronounced, hwa-keen mu-ree-etta. 



182 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO, 

in strange contrast to the daring- and often fiendish spirit 
which controlled his actions in later years. 

At the time Joaquin was seventeen years old, there lived 
near his father's "rancho" a "packer" named Feliz, a wid- 
ower with a sixteen-year-old daughter and a son a few years 
younger. Rosita, the daughter, was her father's sole house- 
keeper, and is described as a dark-eyed, voluptuous beauty of 
the Spanish type. Her father idolized her. 

Joaquin, having little to do besides superintending the 
herding of stock upon the rancho, was often a caller, upon 
various pretexts, at the cabin of Feliz, particularly when the 
old man was absent; and he enjoyed many a chat with the 
handsome Rosita. It was not long until these frequent meet- 
ings between the two young people resulted in. a feeling of 
regard considerably stronger than friendship As the packer 
was absent more than half the time, and no other person ex- 
cept Rosita 's young brother, Reyes, came near — and he but 
seldom intruded — Joaquin and his sweetheart were absolutely 
unrestrained in their intercourse. Given such a condition, 
and the passionate Spanish natures of such a boy and gin, 
and evil must inevitably result, Rosita realized this only 
when her honor was compromised. The father, returning 
home, learned of his daughter's shame, and drove the affright- 
ed Joaquin in rage from his premises. But the fair Rosita, 
forgetting her wrongs in her great love for the person who had 
wronged her, stole away from her father's house one moonlight 
night, and hurried to her lover at his home nearby. 

Joaquin had meanwhile received a letter from his half- 
brother in California, describing that territory in glowing 
terms, and urging him to come there immediately. Joaquin 
soon made his preparations; and mounted upon a fine horse, 
with Rosita beside him upon another, and with two mules 
laden with provisions and other necessaries, he started for the 
land of gold. The trip was uneventful. 

In the spring of 1850, Joaquin was engaged in placer min- 
ing in the Stanislaus district, then one of the richest mining 
localities in the West. He had built a comfortable home and 
lived there in peace and happiness with the beautiful Rosita. 

There were many refined and conscientious Americans in 
California at this time, but there were also a large number of 
persons of very different character — coarse, illiterate men 
calling themselves Americans, but whose every action brought 
disgrace upon that honored name. The latter class had a 
feeling of contempt for all Mexicans, whom they looked upon 
as an inferior race, subjects of the United States and having 
no rights which an American need respect. Joaquin early 
came into contact with representatives of that lawless, domi- 
neering element. 

On a pleasant evening, Joaquin was sitting in his door- 
way, after a hard day's work, and listening to Rosita, who 
was singing a dreamy air of her native land, when a band of 
men approached, and accosting Murieta, demanded, in a su- 
percilious and insulting manner, by what means he, a 



APPENDIX. 183 

"damned Mexican," presumed to be working- a mining- claim 
on American ground. Joaquin, who had learned English 
from Americans he had met frequently in Sonora, replied that, 
under the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, he had a right to be- 
come a citizen of the United States, and that as such he con- 
sidered himself. 

"Well, sir, " said one of the party, "we allow no Mexicans 
to work in this region, and you have got to leave this claim. ' T 

Naturally, Joaquin indignantly remonstrated; but his 
words elicited additional insult and insolence, and one strap- 
ping fellow stepped forward and struck him in the face. Joa- 
quin, with a cry of anger, sprang towards his bowie knife, 
which lay on the bed near-by, when Rosita, fearing for her 
lover's safety, seized and held him. His assailant again ad- 
vanced, and, rudely throwing Rosita aside, struck Joaquin 
repeatedly until the Mexican fell, bruised and bleeding, to 
the floor. At this outrage, Rosita, catching up the knife, 
made a quick thrust at the American But she was quickly 
disarmed by the cowardly ruffian, and thrown fainting, upon 
the bed; and Joaquin, who had meanwhile been bound, hand 
and foot, by other members of the party, saw his beloved com- 
panion deliberately violated by these beasts in the form of 
men. They then left, telling Joaquin that if he were found in 
that cabin or on that claim at the end oi ten days, his. life 
would be forfeited. 

The young Mexican, as his mistress unbound him, swore 
that he would hereafter live for revenge; but Rosita, with 
tears, implored him to live for her, as he knew she lived only 
for him, and to try and forget their wrongs in some other and 
happier place. Her loving entreaties won the day. and Joa- 
quin promised to foi'give the past. 

The outrage above narrated would alone have been enough 
to arouse desires for revenge in the hearts of some of the best 
of men, and Joaquin deserves great praise because of his for- 
bearance at that time. True Joaquin and Rosita were cohab- 
iting without having been legally married; but their relations 
were at least hallowed by mutual, abiding love; while, on the 
other hand, lawful marriage is frequently a mask for legalized 
sensuality. I do not wish to uphold such illicit relationships; 
nevertheless, Joaquin, despite his grave faults, remained true 
to his first love throughout his wild career. He became a 
robber and a cutthroat, but he was never a libertine. 

Joaquin settled next in the mountains of Calaveras county. 
Here he decided to follow the occupation of a farmer. But one 
day, when he was busied with ax and mattock, clearing his 
ground, several Americans rode up and notified him that they 
allowed no "infernal Mexican intruders, " like him, to own. 
land in that neighborhood. Joaquin's anger arose; neverthe- 
less, he answered mildly that he was the only occupant of the 
valley, that he acknowledged allegiance to the American gov- 
ernment, that the treaty of peace between the United States 
and Mexico gave him his choice of citizenship either in Cali- 
fornia or Mexico, as he liked, that he had already been driven 



f84 APPENDIX. 

from the mines without any crime or offense on his part, and that 
all he asked now was a very small piece of ground, and the 
shelter of a humble home for himself and companion. But he 
was ag-ain toid to go, and he went, uncomplainingly. 

Arriving at Murphy's Diggings, in Calaveras 
county, in April, 1850, he once more began mining-, 
this time without interruption. But not meeting with mucia 
success, he abandoned the business and devoted his time to 
dealing "monte. " a popular Mexican game which was in much 
better repute in those days than it is now. Joaquin found the 
new occupation extremely profitable, and his pleasing appear- 
ance and manner, combined with his great good nature, soon 
made him a general favorite. 

His half brother, who has already been mentioned, lived 
near Murphy's Diggings. At one time Joaquin paid him a 
visit, and rode back to the Digging's on a horse borrowed from 
his brother. The animal, whicn Joaquin's brother had bought, 
proved to have been stolen. It was recognized by a number of 
persons in town, among them being the owner, a stout, coarse- 
appearing fellow named J s; mid Joaquin quickly found 

himself surrounded by a furious mob. 

"So, my Covey, "said J s, laying his hand on Joaquin's 

shoulder, "you are the chap that's been a-stealing horses and 
mules around here for the last six months, are you?" 

"You charge me unjustly," replied Joaquin. "I borrowed 
this horse of my brother, who bought it from an American, 
which he can easily prove, as well as show a bill of sale be- 
sides. ' ' 

"This is all gammon, " said J s, "and you are nothing 

.but a dirty thief. ' ' 

"Hang him!" "Hang him!" cried out several voices from 
the crowd, and Joaquin was immediately seized and bound. 
Then some one suggested that, before they went to extremities, 
■they had better see what the half-brother had to say for him- 
self. 

"Yes, nab him, too!" several persons exclaimed, and the 
mob at once started for the half-brother's house, taking their 
^prisoner along with them. 

"All I want you to do gentlemen, " said Joaquin, "is to 
give my brother a chance to prove his and my innocence. Let 
iiim have time to summon his witnesses. " 

Jeers and contempt were the only answer; and the mob, 
having reached the place, seized the half-brother, and, with 
hardly a word of explanation, hurried him to a tree and 
hanged him. Joaquin wept bitterly at the sight and begged 
immediately to dispose of him in a like manner. But the 
crowd had changed their original intention with regard to 
Joaquin, and, instead of being hanged, he was bound to the 
same tree and publicly disgraced by whipping. A spectator 
of the scene afterward declared that he never saw such an ex- 
pression in all his life as at this moment passed over the face 
,of Joaquin. A look of ineffable scorn and hate was bent upon 
ihis torturers, and he measured them from head to foot, as if 



APPENDIX. 185 

he would stamp their images upon his memory forever. He re- 
ceived their blows in Silence and disdain;, and when the deed 
was ended, he donned the garb which hnd been torn from his 
shoulders, and was left alone with his dead brother. 

Standing- over the grave of his last and dearest relative, in 
the presence of a few friends who had come to his assistance, he 
swore an awful oath that his soul should never know peace un- 
til his hands were dyed deep in the blood of his enemies! From that 
hour Joaquin Murieta was a changed man. The generous, kind- 
hearted Mexican had vanished, and in his place walked a moody, 
scowling individual, wrio avoided ail Americans and was fre- 
quently seen riding off into the woods with some of his most dis- 
reputable countrymen. 

Shortly after this an American was found dead near Mur- 
phy's Diggings, having been almost cut in pieces with a knife. 
He was recognized as a member of the mob which had whipped 
Joaquin and hanged his brother. 

Report after report came of the finding of murdered men 
along the highways, and in every instance they were recognized 
as belonging to the mob who had so deeply wronged Joaquin. 
J — s, the owner of the horse which had first caused the trouble, 
was among the missing; but, as his body was not found, no one 
ever knew whether he had been killed or had voluntarily fled the 
country to evade Joaquin. A certain person well acquainted 
with the bandit's career, afterward said: 

"I am inclined to think Joaquin wiped out the most of those 
prominently engaged in whipping him. ' ' 

Thus did Joaquin Murieta, goaded by repeated persecutions 
and outrages, become an outlaw and a bandit before he was nine- 
teen years of age. 

It was then too late to turn back, even had he desired to do 
so. He had already committed deeds which placed him outside 
the pale of the law, and thenceforth robbery was his only means 
of livelihood . 

In 1851 it was learned that an organized banditti were rang- 
ing the country, but their leader's name was unknown. Travel- 
ers, carrying gold from the mines, would be stopped by well- 
dressed men who politely requested them to give up their treasure. 
Strangers, riding along lonely highways, would be noosed with 
the lasso, dragged into the nearest thicket, and murdered. 
Horses of the finest breeds were stolen from the ranches, and be- 
ing followed, were found in the possession of a band of fearless 
men, ready and able to retain their booty. 

The scenes of murder and robbery shifted rapidly to almost 
every point of the compass. No one knew when or where the next 
blow would fall. 

Joaquin, owing to his superior intelligence and education, 
gained an immense influence over his followers, and his forces 
were quickly augmented by others of his countrymen, still smart- 
ing under the stings of defeat in the Mexican War, and anxious 
to be avenged upon at least a portion of their conquerors. In a 
brief space of time Joaquin had gathered about him one of the. 



186 PIONEERS^OF EL DORADO. 

most brutal, fearless and powerful gangs of desperadoes that 
ever existed. 

His lieutenant was Manuel Garcia, better known as "Three- 
Fingered Jack, " so named from the fact of his having had one of 
his fingers shot off in a skirmish with a party of Americans dur- 
ing the Mexican War. This man was by far the worst member 
of all that notorious band of thieves and assassins. If "Three- 
Fingered Jack" possessed a single redeeming trait, no person has 
succeeded in discovering- it. He was virtually a fiend incarnate, 
who committed murder solely for the pleasure it afforded him, 
and who gloated over the agonies of his victims. He was known 
to be the same person who, in 1846, surrounded with his party 
two Americans, young men named respectively Cowie and Fowler, 
as they were traveling between Sonoma and Bodega, stripped 
them completely naked, and, binding them each to a tree, slowly 
tortured them to death. He began by casting knives at their 
bodies, as if practicing at a target. He then cut out their 
tongues, punched out their eyes with his knife, gashed their bod- 
ies in many places, and, concluding by actually skinning his vic- 
tims alive, left them to die! Whenever a particularly revolting, 
diabolical crime was to be committed, this man was always de- 
puted by Joaquin to do the deed; for, even at his worst, Joaquin 
personally never stooped to such a depth of villainy. 

Four other important members of the band were Reyes Feliz, 
Claudio, Joaquin Valenzuela and Pedro Gonzales, The first will 
be remembered as the brother of Rosita, Joaquin's mistress. He 
was but sixteen years of age. His father having died, the boy 
had hastened with the remnant of the property to join Joaquin. 
Not naturally a vicious boy, he was brave, impulsive and gener- 
ous, but had pored over the wild, romantic tales of the chivalrous 
robbers of Spain and Mexico, until he had been fired with a de- 
sire to emvlate those reckless freebooters. Claudio, about thirty- 
five years of age, of a lean, but vigorous constitution, and a 
somewhat savage, yet lively and expressive countenance, was 
brave, but very cautious and cunning, and he wouid spring upon 
his prey most unexpectedly and execute his purposes with the 
greatest secrecy and precision. He was an adept calculator and 
schemer, and he could readily assume an appearance of honesty 
and respectability, Joaquin Valenzuela, a man considerably 
older than his leader, Joaquin Murieta, had served for many 
years under the famous guerilla chief, Padre Jurata. Valen- 
zuela was often entrusted by Murieta with the leadership of the 
band. He was used to being mistaken for his chief; some per- 
sons, who knew him Simply as "Joaquin," and who saw him 
after the announcement of Joaquin Murieta 's death, insisted that 
the notorious Murieta was still alive. 

Pedro Gonzales, while less brave than many others, was a 
skillful spy and expert horse-thief, and as such was a valuable 
adjunct to a body of mounted men who constantly required fresh 
supplies of horses, as well as a thorough knowledge of conditions 
around them. 

It was estimated that the company's membership at that 
jperiod was at least fifty, and it was continually being increased 



APPENDIX. 187 

"by the addition of new members, including a few renegade Amer- 
icans. 

At the head of this powerful organization, Joaquin ravaged 
various parts ot the State during 1851, though at that time he was 
not generally known as the leader; his subordinates, Claudio, 
Valenzuela and Pedro Gonzales, each repeatedly being mistaken 
for the chief. Few persons really knew his name, although many 
were personally acquainted with him and saw him frequently in 
different towns and villages, without having the faintest idea that 
he was responsible for the many bloody events which were filling 
the country roundabout with terror and dismay. He would live 
for weeks at a time in various neighborhoods, apparently engaged 
in gambling, or employed as a vaquero, a packer, or in some 
other peaceful occupation. 

In the Summer of 1851, while he was living- in a secluded part 
of San Jose, be became one night involved in a row at a fan- 
dango, was arrested for a breach of the peace, brought before a 
magistrate and fined twelve dollars. He was in charge of Mr.. 
Clark, the Deputy-Sheriff of Santa Clara county, who was par- 
ticularly hated by the banditti on account of his determined at- 
tempts to arrest members of the gang. But Joaquin was person- 
ally unknown to the deputy, and when the bandit politely re- 
quested the officer to come to his residence in the outskirts of the 
town, where he would pay him the money, Mr. Clark, suspecting 
nothing, promptly acquiesced. 

The two men were walking along, conversing pleasantly, 
when suddenly, at the edge of a thicket, Joaquin drew a knife,, 
and, telling the officer he had brought him there to kill him,, 
quickly stabbed him to the heart. 

In the fall of the same year, Joaquin moved further north and 
settled with his mistress at the "Sonorian Camp," a village of 
tents and cloth houses, situated three miles from Marysville, 
Yuba county. Soon the country rang with the accounts of fre- 
quent, diabolical murders. Seven men were killed within three 
or four days in a region about twelve miles in extent. 

Not long after this, two men, traveling on the road which 
leads up Feather river, near Honcut creek, discovered in advance 
of them four Mexicans, one of whom was dragging at his saddle- 
bow, by a lariat, an American whom they had just lassoed, 
around the neck. Not thinking it prudent to interfere, the travel- 
ers hastened to a place of safety and reported what they had seen. 
Upon search being made, four other men were found murdered 
near the same place, having upon their throats the fatal mark of 
the lariat. 

Following these outrages, came reports that several persons, 
had been robbed and killed at Bid well's Bar, ten or fifteen miles 
up the river, 

Suspicion fell on the Sonorian Camp, as it was occupied ex- 
clusively by Mexicans, many of whom had no visible emploj'ment 
but who rode fine horses and spent money liberally. This sus- 
picion was confirmed by the partial confession of a Mexican thief 
who had been captured by the ' 'Vigilance Committee" of Marys- 
ville, and had been run up with a rope several times to the branch. 



188 PIONEERS ON EL DORADO. 

•of a tree. He denied that he was guilty of any crime himself, 
but asserted that the Sonorian Camp was the 'retreat of certain 
persons who had been carrying- on the system of murders and 
robberies complained of. 

Obtaining- a description of the most important residents of 
the suspected camp, the Sheriff of Yuba county, R. B. Buchanan, 
accompanied by a man known as '"Ike Bowen," started off one 
moonlight evening to examine the premises, and, if possible, to 
surprise the outlaws and capture one or more of them. Hitching 
their horses half a mile from the camp, they continued the journey 
on foot. Coming abruptly upon a small tent, a few hundred 
yards from the main camp, they were barked at by a vicious dog, 
whose fierce outcries threatened to alarm the encampment. 

"It won't do to be bothered with such a howling as this," 
said Buchanan, "and we must kill that dog. It strikes me that 
I can manage it. If we appear to be frightened, he will come 
directly up to take hold of one or the other of us. Then we must 
let him have a little cold steel. " 

So the two moved off hastily, and, as Buchanan had predict- 
ed, the animal rushed forward savagely. Bowen, being a tittle 
in the rear, the dog sprang upon his back, got him down, and 
was proceeding to inflict more serious injury, when Buchanan, 
drawing a bowie knife, plunged it into the heart of the beast, 
laying him dead on the spot. 

The dog being disposed of, the Sheriff and his companion 
continued their advance, but the stirring to and fro on the out- 
skirts of the camp showed them that too much warning had al- 
ready been given. 

In an isolated corner near a piece of fencing, a Mexican 
wrapped in his serape was standing and peering out anxiously 
into the shadows. He seemed to answer the description of the 
Sonorian desperadoes, as given by the thief whom the Vigilance 
Committee had frightened into confessing 

"Let us get down on our hands and knees, or we may be 
discovered," said Buchanan. 

Crawling in this way, they reached the fence and discovered 
that the Mexican had disappeared. 

"The fellow has seen us," remarked Buchanan, "and we 
must look sharp or he and his crowd will have the advantage. " 

He and Bowen had just begun to crawl through the fence, 
when they were startled by three distinct shots, which were 
quickly repeated. Extricating themselves from the fence, they 
rose to their feet and saw three Mexicans firing at them from a 
spot near a bush, behind which they had hidden. The Sheriff 
and his deputy quickly returned the Are, and a lively engage- 
ment followed. The Mexicans retired, apparently uninjured, and 
Buchanan then discovered that he himself was severely wound- 
ed. A few hundred yards from the scene of the encounter, he 
fell to the ground and was unable to rise. The ball had struck 
him near the spine, and, passing through his body, had come out 
in front near the navel. Leaving him lying there, Bowen hurried 
to his horse and rode swiftly to town for a-sistance, which soon 
arrived, and Buchanan was taken back to Marysville. He re- 



APPENDIX. 18£! 

mained long in a very critical condition, but eventually recovered, 
to the extreme gratification of the community, who had good rea- 
son to admire the brave officer who had nearly sacri- 
ficed his life at the call of duty. It was not until 
years afterward that Sheriff Buchanan learned that 
he had received his wound in a personal encounter with the 
celebrated bandit, Joaquin Murieta. It was he who had stood 
near the fence and discovered the approaching forms of the Sheriff 
and his companion. 

After this occurrence, the banditti soon left the vicinity of 
Marysville and rode off into the Coast Range mountains to the 
west of Mount Shasta. Here the}" hid themselves for months in 
the forests, venturing forth only at intervals for the purpose of 
stealing horses In this work they induced many of the Indians 
to help them. So many valuable horses disappeared, that the 
settlers were finally aroused to action On one occasion a party 
of exasperated Americans, on the track of their stolen animals, 
. succeeded in hemming the Indian thieves in between a perpen- 
dicular wall of bluffs and a deep river, so that the only avenue of 
escape was the stream, which swept by in an angry, foaming 
torrent. They opened fire upon the Indians, who leaped into the 
river, a few succeeding in crossing, but most of them being 
stopped by avenging bullets. Suddenly a tall Mexican, mounted 
upon a fine horse, dashed down the bank, firing his revolver as 
he rode, and plunged into the river. He had gained the middle 
of the current when a lank Missourian, the best marksman in 
the party, dismounted from his horse, drew his rifle to his 
shoulder, and, taking careful aim, fired. The Mexican leaned 
forward an instant, then floated from the saddle and sank, while 
the riderless steed breasted the waves and reached the opposite 
shore in safety. 

In those trackless wilds through which none but straggling 
miners passed at intervals, human skeletons were afterwards 
found, some of which showed plainly the mark of the leaden ball; 
and the ignorant Indians had to answer for many a deed perpe- 
trated by civilized [?] beings More than one prospector went up 
into the mountains in the fall and winter of 1851, and never was 
seen again. 

In the spring of 1852, Joaquin and his party, traveling by 
night only, visited the province of Sonora, his old Mexican home, 
taking two or three hundred horses, stolen during the winter. 
Returning in a few weeks, the bandits established headquarters 
at Arroyo Cantoova, a large tract of fine pasture land lying be- 
tween the Tejon and Pacheco pass, east of the Coast Range and 
west of Tulare Lake. A few weeks later Joaquin divided his 
band, comprising about seventy men, into separate companies, 
headed by Claudia, Three-Fingered Jack and Valenzuela, and 
despatched them to various localities, with orders to devote them- 
selves mainly to stealing horses and mules, as he had a scheme 
to carry out which required at least fifteen hundred or two thou- 
sand animals. He himself, in company with Re3^es Feliz, Pedro 
Gonzales and Juan, and three women — Rosita and the mistresses 
of Feliz and Gonzales— proceeded on a different course. AIL 



190 PIONEERS ON EL DORADO. 

were heavily armed, including the females who were dressed in 
male attire. Reaching Mokelumne Hill, Calaveras county, they 
took up quarters with some Mexican acquaintances in that place; 
white the other inhabitants of the town, deceived by the genteel 
appearance of the newcomers, looked upon them simply as peace- 
able residents of the neighborhood. The women of the party, 
who now appeared in their proper attire, were admired for their 
very modest and quiet deportment, None suspicioned that the 
men, riding forth at night, scoured the country for miles around, 
upon stealthy and questionable expeditions. 

Early in May Joaquin decided to leave Mokelumne Hill, 
which he resolved to do at the hour of midnight. The horses 
were saddled, the women dressed in their masculine garments, 
and everything was ready, when Joaquin sauntered out into the 
streets for his customary visits to the sundry drinking and gam- 
bling resorts. Sitting at a monte table, where he had carelessly 
put down a dollar or two to while away the time, his attention 
was suddenly arrested by hearing someone pronounce his name. 

Looking up, he beheld three or four Americans just opposite 
him engaged in a loud and earnest conversation. One of them, 
a tall fellow, armed with a revolver, remarked, 

"I would just like once in my life to come across Joaquin, 
and I would kill him as quick as I wou'd a snake." 

The bold outlaw, upon hearing that speech, jumped upon the 
the monte table in view of the whole room, and drawing his pistol, 
cried loudly, 

"I am Joaquin! If there is any shooting to do I am in!" 

The act was so sudden and unexpected that instant confusion 
reigned, and in the midst of the general consternation Joaquin 
gathered his cloak about him and walked out unharmed. But 
his fearless avowal of his identity rendered a longer stay in that 
neighborhood extremely dangerous. So, mounting his horse as 
quickly as possible, he dashed away with his party at his heels, 
sending back a shout of defiance that echoed loudly through the 
darkness. 

Returning to his rendezvous at Arroyo Cantoova, he learned 
that his marauding bands had collected two or three hundred 
head of horses, and were awaiting his orders. He sent a portion 
of the men to take the animals into Sonora for safekeeping and 
he also made remittances of money to a secret partner of his in 
that state. 

It was soon after this that Joaquin, being short of funds, 
needlessly murdered a young- American teamster, and that his 
conscience always smote bim because of the murder of so honest 
and hard-working a young man. But the victim had tried to draw 
a pistol and Joaquin felt compelled to kill him. 

At this period Captain Harry Love was at the head of a 
small party, organized on his own responsibility, in search of this 
notorious outlaw and his gang. Love had been an express rider 
in the Mexican War, and hadcarried dispatches from one miUtary 
post to another, over the most dangerous parts of Mexico. He had 
traveled a^one for hundreds of miles over mountains and deserts, 
in a region beset by guerillas, those bands of lawless men who 



APPENDIX. 191 

hung- upon the skirts of the American army, lay in ambush at 
mountain passes and watering- places, and murdered every per- 
son who fell into their hands. As they rode fast horses and were 
expert in using- the lariat, it required a well-mounted horseman 
to escape them on the open plains. Many a hard race had Cap- 
tain Love run to Save his own life and the valuable papers com- 
mitted to his care. Since early youth he had been a hardy pio- 
neer, inured to all the dang-ers and hardships of the border. His 
previous training, together with his unvarying- coolness in times 
of danger, made him well-fitted to cope with a person having 
Joaquin's quickness and precision of thought and action. 

Captain Love was already on the outlaw's trail when Ruddle 
was murdered. With as great speed as was consistent with the 
caution necessary in such a case, he pursued him by the bloody 
landmarks which the robberies and murders left behind him as 
far as the rancho of San Luis Gonzagoes, which is now known 
to have been the place which regularly gave shelter to the ban- 
ditti, Reaching- that spot he ascertained by means of spies that 
the persons he was searching- for were staying in a canvas house 
on the edg-e of the rancho. 

Cautiously the Captain and his men stole up to the place in- 
dicated, and had just reached the door when the alarm was g-iven 
by a woman in a neig-hboring tent, and in an instant Joaquin, 
Gonzalez, Reyes Feliz and Juan had cut their way through the 
back part of the canvas and escaped into the g-loom without. On 
entering the pursuers found no one but women, three of whom, 
then dressed in their proper attire, were the bandits' mistresses, 
of which fact the Captain was ig-norant, however. 

Leaving- the women to look out for themselves, the fugitives 
went to their horses, which were tied in an udj icent thicket, 
mounted them and rode directly to Oris Timbers, eight miles dis- 
tant, where they stole twenty horses and drove them into the 
neighboring mountains. They remained in hiding all the next day, 
but at night returned, unanticipated by Love, and, with the wom- 
en, rode back into the hills. Driving tne stolen horses before 
them, they started across the Tulare Plains toward Los Angeles. 
The Captain followed them no further, having business which 
recalled him. 

At this time Captain Harry Love, whom the robbers dreaded 
most of all, was Deputy-Sheriff of Los Angeles county. Love 
knew Gonzales personally, and he had caught a glimpse of that 
outlaw and his associate, Juan, near the Buena, Ventura Rancho, 
which was known by a very few to have been a harboring-place for 
Joaquin and was closely watched in consequence. In a few days 
word came to the robber chieftain that Captain Love had captured 
Gonzales and that Juan had escaped after a very close clipping 
aloBg the top of his head by a bullet from the Captain's re\»olver. 
Joaquin heard also that the doughty officer was at that moment 
hurryieg with the prisoner to LoS Angeles where he would cer- 
tainly be hanged. Determined to rescue his confederate, Joaquin, 
started at full speed to overtake Love. They came in sight of the 
two men at daybreak the next morning'. Gonzalez not bound, but 
unarmed, was ridiog at the side of his captor. Seeing his com- 
rades approaching, he waved his handkerchief. At that the Cap- 



192 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

tain turned, and, catching- sight of the bandits,, immediate^ 
drew his revolver and shot Gonzales through the heart. Then, 
putting spurs to his horse, he soon distanced the enraged desper- 
adoes ! 

While in this neighborhood the gang aiterward ambushed 
and cruelly assassinated General Bean, a wealthy citizen of Los 
Angeles, who had incurred the enmity of the robbers by his un- 
tiring efforts to bring them to justice. Captain Wilson, Deputy- 
Sheriff of Santa Barbara county, who had come to San Gabriel 
in search of Joaquin, was enticed out by means of a mock Indian 
row and served in like manner. These outrages roused the 
whole southern country, and Joaquin, hastily collecting his 
party, moved northward into Calaveras count}'. A young man, 
Joe Lake, who had been the bandit's friend in Joaquin's hon- 
estier and happier days, met the chief here and was warned not 
to speak of the meeting. But Lake, true to his duty as a man 
and a citizen, divulged his secret to acquaintances in the town of 
Hornitas, was shadowad by a spy of the robber's, and the next 
day shot dead by Joaquin himself, who entered the town in dis- 
guise, and escaped amid a shower of bullets from the pistols of 
the bystanders. 

For some months after this the banditti sojourned in the 
wilds of Mono county, where they spent the time in the peaceful 
occupation of exploring that almost unknown region. Reyes 
Feliz, who was still weak from the wounds inflicted by the grizzly 
bear, remained meanwhile at San Gabriel in the care of his mis- 
tress . 

Early in October Joaquin and his men journeyed to the vi- 
cinity of San Luis Obispo. While there, the bandit read in a 
copy of the "Los Angeles Star" that Reyes Feliz, brother of Ro- 
sita, Joaquin's mistress, had been caught, and after a trial on 
the charge of being a party to the murder of General Bean, had 
been hanged. It is but just to state, however, that Feliz, though 
concerned in many a cruel murder, was guiltless of that particu- 
lar crime for which he was executed. His female companion, 
heart-broken, wandered into the forest, where she died. Soon 
after this, news came that Mountain Jim had been executed at 
San Diego. 

Joaquin, hearing that a party of Americans was scouring the 
woods in search of his gang, gathered his men together and suc- 
ceeded in ambushing his enemies. But a fierce combat took 
place, in which twenty bandits, one being Claudio, were killed, 
and about an equal number of the Americans, including their 
young leader, lost their lives. Some weeks later the outlaws 
started for Mariposa county. During the journey they had oc- 
casion one night to arouse a ferryman near the Tuolumne river. 
The man came out in great terror and asked what was wanted. 

"We want to cross the river," Joaquin replied, "and before 
doing so we wish to obtain from you the loan of what spare cash 
you may have about you. You have the best evidence of the ur- 
gency of our request, " cocking the pistol and presenting it close 
to the fellow's head. 

"Never mind the evidence, Senor. I believe you without it. 



APPENDIX. 193 



I will certainly loan you all I have got." 

He lighted a caudle and produced from beneath hisipillow a 
purse containing- one hundred dollars. 

"Come, " said Tnree- lingered Jack, bursting- a cap at the 
man's head, "you have g-ot more;" and he was cocking his pistol 
again when Joaquin reprimanded him sharply. And then, turn- 
ing to the ferryman, he asked, 

"Is this all you have got?" 

"Precisely all, Senor; but you are welcome to it. " 

"I won't take it," said the chief proudly. "You are a poor 
man and never injured me. Put us over the river and I will pay 
you for your trouble. " 

This incident is an evidence of the latent goodness in the ban- 
dit's nature, of which we get occasional glimpses even during his 
worst days. 

The bandits soon arrived in the neighborhood of Stockton, 
and one Sunday Joaquin rode into that city, attracting much 
notice because of his nandsome face and costly raiment. While 
there he observed the following notice posted upon the side of a 
house: 

"Five Thousand Dollars Reward for Joaquin— dead or 
alive. " 

The young Mexican dismounted, wrote these words in pencil 
underneath, "I will give HO, 000. Joaquin;" then mounted and 
leisurely rode out of town. 

Learning one evening that a vessel would shortly go down 
Stockton slough, toward San Francisco, and would have on board 
two miners from San Andreas, Calaveras county, with heavy 
bags of gold-dust, which they were taking to their home in the 
East, Joaquin, with three of his men, proceeded in a small boat 
to an obscure part of the slough, intercepted the vessel, Doarded 
it, killed four persons, including the miners, and escaped with 
the gold-dust, but left two of his brother bandits lifeless on the 
deck, killed by the two miners almost simultaneously with their 
own fall. 

After returning to his rendezvous in Arroyo Cantoova, Joa- 
quin called his bands together, one hundred members in ail, and 
fully explained to them his views and purposes. He told his fol- 
lowers that he could command, at will, two thousand men who 
were ready to organize in Sonora, Mexico, and in this State; that 
he had abundant funds deposited in a safe place— meaning with 
his secret partner in Sonora; that he intended to arm and equip 
the entire band, and scour the whole southern portion of the 
state, killing the Americans by hundreds, burning their ranches 
and running off with their property, so rapidly that his enemies 
would not have time to collect an opposing force until he had fin- 
ished his raid and escaped into the mountains of Sonora, where 
he would then settle down for the remainder of his life. 

But the details of this bold and atrocious scheme leaked out 
in some way and came to the ears of Captain Harry Love and 
others, causing them to renew their efforts to capture or slay the 



194 PIONEERS OF EL DOKADO. 

robber chieftain. 

There is not space in a single chapter to relate in full the 
subsequent career of this most remarkable outlaw. It is a long- 
record of crimes done in various parts of California. All that 
can be given in a work of this nature is a hasty sketch of the gen- 
eral events in the bandit's life, describing- minutely only the 
most important happening's. This book is intended as a history 
of El Dorado county, and little space can be allowed to the deeds 
of an outlaw in other communities of the state. 

During- his stay at the rendezvous Joaquin was one day per- 
suaded by his mistress to spare the lives of an American party 
of ten hunters whom he had enticed into his camp. And shortly 
after, in Stanislaus county, when one of his followers had ab- 
ducted a beautiful young- woman, Joaquin exhibited the best side 
of his character by giving- the offender a vig-orous tongue-lashing 
and promptly returning- the girl, unharmed, to her mother. 

Joaquin's narrowest escape from death occurred in Calaveras 
county. At the head of a branch of the South Fork of the Mokel- 
umne river, near the boundary line of Calaveras and El Dorado 
counties, he came, unattended, upon a party of twenty-five miners, 
fully armed. Joaquin found them very hospitable, as miners are 
inclined to be; and he was conversing sociably, while he sat with 
one leg thrown over his horse's neck, until Jim Boyce, one of the 
partners, returning from the spring with a pail of water, ap- 
peared in view. At the first sight of him the young Mexican 
flung his reclining leg back over the saddle and spurred his 
ahorse. 

' 'Boys, that fellow is Joaquin!" roared Boyce. "Damn it, 
shoot him!" and he himself fired, but without success. 

The bandit dashed away. His only chance to escape was 
along a narrow digger trail, over a ledge of rock a hundred 
yards in length, whereon the least misstep would hurl him to his 
death one hundred feet below. But not a moment did he faiter. 
With the bullets of his enemies cutting the air ail around him, 
he rode at full speed over that fearfui trail. For a hundred yards 
he was exposed to those leaden missiles, but he waved his bowie- 
knife in defiance and shouted tauntingly: 

"I am Joaquin! Kill me if you can!" 

Thicker came the hurtling bal's, and bullet after bullet flat- 
tened on the wall of slate at his right. His hat was shot from his 
head and left his long black hair floating behind him. He had 
no time to use his revolver, but he continued to wave his glittering 
blade as he flew onward in that wild ride In a few moments an 
exultant whoop announced that the bold outlaw had escaped. 
But his late pursuers were to meet him again in a manner they 
never anticipated. 

Promptly, the next morning, Jim Boyce and his companions 

started in search of the bandit's hiding-place. But Joaquin, 

lenowing Boyce 's determined character, and expecting pursuit, 

left his camp at night, at the head of his men, and making a cir- 

•*cuit of five miles, waited in ambush for his foes. 



APPENDIX. 19S 

The next nig-ht the miners were seated around the fire in a- 
camp lately deserted by the outlaws. They were laughing- and~ 
joking, all unconscious of danger, when, with a start' ing ab- 
ruptness, the simultaneous reports of fifteen pistols cut the air, 
and the survivors, springing- up in affright, saw fifteen of their 
comrades stretched upon the earth. Instantly a second volley 
swept the camp, seven other men dropped, and the three surviv- 
ors, including- Jim Boyce, fled headlong into the darkness and 
escaped. Three Fingered Jack leaped into the camp, and with 
his knife held tightly in that mutilated hand, so often stained 
with human blood, soon quenched any sparks of life remaining- in 
those hapless victims. About thirty thousand dollars in gold- 
dust, fifteen horses and ten mules were the fruits of this most 
cowardly butchery, one of the foulest deeds in the who e span of 
Joaquin's wretched existence. 

But Calaveras county soon proved too warm a rendezvous for 
that band of outlaws. The deputy-Sheriff of that county, Cap- 
tain Charles H. Ellis, a chiva'rous young Southerner, to whom 
fear was a thing unknown, took the lead in a movement to bring 
the criminals to justice. In several encounters Ellis wounded 
and killed a number of Joaquin's most valued followers, and 
afterward burned various dens of the robbers and finally drove 
them into other counties, where he continued for a time to harass 
them. Jn all this campaign Ellis lost very few men. 

The bandits continued their murdering depredations in other- 
neighborhoods, bui their days of triumph were numbered, for at 
last the State of California itself had come to the aid of the peo- 
ple. In a response to a petition having numerous signatures, a 
bill was passed by the Legislature and signed by the Governor, 
authorizing Captain Harry Love to organize a company of 
"Mounted Rangers, " in order to capture, or drive out of the 
country, or exterminate the highwaymen. The bill became a 
law May 17, 1853, and on the 28th day of the same month Cap- 
tain Love organized his company, consisting of twenty picked- 
men, all that the bill provided for Each member was to receive 
one hundred and fifty dollars monthly, and the legal existence of 
the company was limited to three months. Following is a list of; 
the men's names: 

P. E. Connor, C. F. Bloodworth, G. W. Evans, William 
Byrnes, John Nuttal. William S. Henderson, C. V. McGowan, 
Robert Masters, W. H. Harvey, George A. Nuttal, Colonel Mc~ 
Lane, Lafayette Black, D. S. Hollister, P. T. Herbert; John S- 
White, Willis Prescott, James M. Norton, Coho Young, E. B- 
Van Dorn and S. K. Piggott. 

With unflagging energy, yet with extreme caution, Captain 
Love immediately set to work to obtain a full knowledge of the 
haunts of the robber chieftain, the latest traces of his move- 
ments, and all else necessary to enable him to make the attack at 
the most favorable time and place. 

Meanwhile Joaquin himself, and Reis, Three-Fingered Jack r 
and a few other men were in the valley some distance from At- 



196 PIONEERS ON EL DORADO. 



royo Cantoova, waiting- the final arrival of all the promised 
forces from Sonora and other quarters. Seventy of his men hac? 
already arrived at Arrojo Cantoova, with fifteen hundred horses. 
Joaquin, little dreaming- of the dang-er so near to him, was com- 
pleting the final arrangements for his projected campaign of 
Southern California. 

On the fifth of July, Captain Love, who had been quietly fol- 
lowing the bandit's movements, left San Jose with his company 
and camped near San Juan for a few days, scouring the moun- 
tains in that vicinity. From San Juan he started at night, 
along the coast route, in the direction of los Angeles, and staid 
one or two nights on the Salinas Plains. Thence he went across 
the San Bonita valley, camping just before daylight, without be- 
ing discovered, in a small valley in the Coast Range, dose to 
Quien Sabe Rancho. After a short survey of this neighborhood, 
"he proceeded to Eag!e's Pass, where he met a party of Mexi- 
cans, who said that they were going into the Tulares to capture 
the wild mustangs, which fed there in great numbers. At 
Eagle's Pass the Rangers divided, a portion going to the Chico 
Panoche Pass, and the others taking a course through the 
mountains. They discovered trails which led both divisions to 
the same point — the Bayou Seetas, or Little Prairie. Before 
reaching that place Captain I ove stopped a few Mexicans, who 
were evidently carrying the news of his advance into that wild 
and suspicious region. Separating once more, the company 
again met at the Grand Panoche Pass, whence they went in a 
body to the Arroyo Cantoova, where they found seventy men of 
Joaquin's band, with the fifteen hundred stolen horses. Here, 
Captain Love, realizing the futility of opposing with his twenty 
men so large a force, wisely sought to deceive the Mexicans by 
informing them that he was executing a commission on the part 
of the State to obtain a list of all the names of the men engaged 
in mustang hunting, in order that a tax might be collected from 
them for the privilege, in accordance with a late act of the Leg- 
islature. After this explanation, and after going through the 
form of taking down the names of the party, he started in the di- 
rection of San Juan, but turned about seven or eight miles off, at 
the head of the Arroyo, in order to watch their movements. It 
was now the 24th of July, on the morning of which day he re- 
turned to the Mexican encampment and found it deserted, not a 
man or even a horse being left. Fully convinced now that the late 
tenants of the camp were a portion of Joaquin's band, he resolved 
to follow their trail. On the next day, which was Sunday, at 
three o'clock in the morning he reached the Tulare Plains, where 
he found that the bandits had divided their company, some going 
south toward the Tejon Pass, and others north toward the San 
Joaquin river. Detailing a part of the Rangers to proceed to 
Mariposa county with the rest of his party, numbering only eight 
men, fearlessly pursued the southern trail, which led in the di- 
rection where Joaquin was most likely to be found. Just at day- 
break he saw smoke rising from the plains on his left, and, turn- 



APPENDIX. I9P 



ing'from'the trail, r he rode out toward it. He saw "nothing- but 
some loose horses, until within six hundred yards of the spot 
from where the smoke came, when, ascending a mound, he dis- 
covered seven men scattered around a small fire, one of whom- 
was a few steps off, washing a superb bay horse with water 
which he held in a pan. Their sentinel, who had just been cook- 
ing, at this moment caught sight of the approaching party, and' 
gave the alarm to his comrades, who all rushed for their horses,, 
except the man who already held his by the lariat at camp. Hur- 
rying forward, the Rangers succeeded in stopping every man 
before he reached his animal. Captain Love, riding up to the 
individual who stood holding the horse, asked him what course 
he and his friends were traveling. The fellow answered that 
they were going to Los Ange'es. It was evident that the camp- 
ers were Mexicans, and they were all finely dressed, each wear- 
ing over his other costly garments, an expensive broadcloth cloak.. 
Upon a nod from Captain Love, two of the younger Rangers, 
Henderson and White, stood watching the man who held the 
horse. The Captain, addressing another Mexican as to their 
destination, received a reply in direct contradiction to the other 
person, who flushed angrily and repeated, 

"No! we're going to Los Angeles;" and turning to Captain. 
Love, he added, "Sir, if you have any questions to ask, address 
yourself to- me. I am the leader of this company. " 

The Captain replied, 

"I will address myself to whom L;please, without consulting- 
you." 

The leader, as he called himself, then advanced toward the 
saddles and blankets, which lay around the fire, when Captain- 
Love ordered him to halt. He walked on, unheeding the com- 
mand, when the captain drew his revolver and told him if he did 
not stop instantly he would blow his brains out. With a dis- 
dainful toss of his head, and grating his teeth together in rage, 
the Mexican stepped back and laid his hand upon his horse's 
mane. This man was Joaquin Murieta, though Captain Love 
was then ignorant of the fact. He was armed onlj' with a bowie- 
knife, and was advancing toward his saddle to get his pistols at 
the time the Captain covered him with his six-shooter. A short 
distance away stood Three-Fingered Jack, fully armed and anx- 
iously watching his chief's every movement. Separated by their 
pursuers, surprised, and unable to act in a body; afoot and un- 
able to reach their horses, were scattered here and there other 
members of the gang. Joaquin was in great and imminent dan- 
ger, yet his face gave no sign of fear . He held his head firmly 
and looked about with a cool and unflinching glance, as if he 
were studying his desperate chances. Occasionally he patted 
his horse upon the neck, and the spirited animal raised his 
graceful head, pricked up his ears and stood with eyes flashing, 
as if ready to start at a word from his master. 

At this juncture Lieutenant Byrnes, who had known the rob- 
ber chieftain in his honest days, rode into the camp, ^having 



198 PIONEERS ON EL DORADO. 

fallen behind by order of Captain Love. Instantly, Joaquin,, 
recognizing the Lieutenant, called out to his followers to make: 
their escape, every man for himself. Three-Fingered Jack was 
off like a flash, drawing the fire of several Rangers. Attention 
being momentarily diverted from Joaquin, he mounted his horse 
and rode off, without saddle or bridle, at lightning speed. A 
dozen bullets from the Colt's repeaters whizzed harmlessly past 
him. Rushing along a rough and rocky ravine, reckless of the 
danger, he leaped from a precipice ten or twelve feet high, and 
was thrown violently to the earth, while the horse turned a half- 
summersauit as he struck the ground, and fell on his back with 
his heels within a few inches of his master's head. 

One of the pursuers, Henderson, leaped fearlessly after him, 
while others galloped around to head him off at a certain favor- 
able point. Henderson and his horse fell as had fallen the ban- 
dit and his steed, and whi'e the young Ranger was remounting 
Joaquin succeeded in getting a long distance ahead. The spir- 
ited charger was fast bearing his rider to safety; a few more 
bounds would carry him beyond the reach of gun-shot. At this 
moment, however, one of the rangers, seeing that the rider could 
not be hit, leveled his rifle at the horse and sent a ball obliquely 
into his side. The noble steed sank, but rose once more, still 
vigorous, though bleeding profusely, and was carrying his mas- 
ter out of reach of all danger, when a sudden gush of blood came 
from the mouth and nostrils of the poor animal, and he fell dead 
beneath his rider, who, far ahead of his enemies, ran on, afoot. 
But they soon out-ran him upon their horses, and coming within 
pistol range, discharged several balls into his body. As the 
third bullet struck him. Joaquin, facing his pursuers, said, 

"Don't shoot any more; the work is done!" 

For a few moments he stood there, his face blanching as the 
life-blood ebbed away; then, sinking slowly to the ground upon 
his right arm, succumbed to death. 

Thus, in his twenty-second year, died Joaquin Murieta, 
whose natural qualities might have brought him fame and re- 
spect, but who chose to be remembered by posterity as a leader 
of assassins and freebooters. Yet, when we think of the foul 
wrongs perpetrated against this man by our fellow Americans, 
can we wonder at his vengeance? 

Three Fingered Jack, followed by Captain Love and one or 
two other Rangers, ran on and on. frequently gaining a consid- 
erable distance on his pursuers, whose horses would occasionally 
stumble in the gopher holes and soft soil of the plain and throw 
their riders headlong. When overtaken, he would whirl de- 
fiantly and discharge his six-shooter. Though a good shot, out 
of five trials he missed every time. But he went onward till he 
fell, pierced by nine bullets, and died with his hand on his pis- 
to 1 . He was finally shot through the head by Captain Love, who 
had wounded him twice before during that five-mile race. Two 
other bandits were killed and two taken prisoners. 

In order to prove to the satisfaction of the public that the cel- 
ebrated bandit was actually dead, "Captain Love was compelled 



APPENDIX. 199 

to adopt a somewhat barbarous course. He caused the head of 
Joaquin to be cut off and hurried away to the nearest place, one 
hundred and fifty miles, where alcohol could be obtained in which 
to preserve it. Three-Fingered Jack's head was also cut off, but 
being- shot throug-h, became offensive and had to be thrown 
away. But that terrib'e mutilated hand, from which the bloody 
outlaw derived his nickname was preserved. 

During- the return of the Rang-ers from this expedition, one 
of the prisoners broke away and drowned himself in a nearb} r 
slough. The other was taken to the Mariposa county jail and 
kept there until the company were ready to disband, when he 
was transferred to Martinez. While there he made a confession 
implicating- a large number of his countrymen in sundry crimes. 
He was ready to make still more important disclosures; but one 
nig-ht the jail was broken into by an armed mob and the prisoner 
taken out and hang-ed. The Americans knew nothing of the pro- 
ceeding-, but it is probable that he was put out of the way by 
Mexicans, who feared the result of the damning- revelations the 
captured robber would have made. 

Naturally the death of Murieta caused the disruption of the 
powerful org-anization he had established. Its subordinate 
chiefs followed a marauding- iife in various parts of California 
and Mexico, but their petty outbreaks were readily checked by 
the firm hand of the law. 

Rosita spent the remainder of her life with her dead lover 'a 
parents, in the province of Sonora, Mexico. 

Among the many affidavits positively identifying- the robber's 
head, the following- are selected. The Reverend Father Dominie 
Blaine, who knew Joaquin well, and who had often confessed 
wounded members of his band, thus testified: 

'"State of California, ) 

County of San Joaquin, y 

On this, the 11th day of August 1853, personally came before 
me, A. C. Baine, a Justice of the Peace in and for said county, 
the Reverend Father Dominie Blaine, who makes oath in due 
form of law, that he' was acquainted with the notorious robber, 
Joaquin; that he has just examined the captive's head now in 
the possession of Captain Connor, of Harry Love's Rang-ers, and 
that he verily believes the said head to be that of the individual 
Joaquin Murieta, so known by him two years ag-o, as before 
stated. 

D. BLAINE, 

Sworn to and subscribed before me the day and year afore- 
said. 

A.. C, BAINE, J. P. 

Ig-nacio Lisarrago, of Sonora, then well known in the lower 
part of the State, testified as follows: 

"State of California, 
City and County of San Francisco. 

Ig-nacio Lisarrag-o, of Sonora, being- duly sworn, says: That 
he has seen the alleged head of Joaquin, now in the possession of 
Messrs. Nutall and Black, two of Captain Love's Rangers, on 



200 PIONEERS OF EL DORADO. 

exhibition at the saloon of John King-, Sansome street. * That de- 
ponent was well acquainted with Joaquin Murieta, and that the 
head so exhibited is and was the veritable head of Joaquin Mu- 
rieta, the celebrated bandit, 

IGNACIO LISARRAGO. 

Sworn to before me, this 17th day of August, 1853. 

Charles D. Carter, 
Notary Public. 

Such affidavits, tog-ether with certificates from sworn officers 
of the law, and the voluntary verbal testimony of hundreds of 
visitors at the different exhibitions of the ghastly relics, fully 
satisfied the legal authorities of the noted outlaw's death. Cap- 
tain Harry Love received one thousand dollars, which Governor 
John Bigler, in his official capacity, had offered for the capture 
of Joaquin Murieta, dead or alive; and on the 15th day of May, 
1854, the Legislature of California, considering that his valuable 
services in ridding the country of so terrible a presence were 
not sufficiently rewarded, passed an act granting Captain Love 
an additional sum of five thousand dollars. 



APPENDIX. 201 



GOLD PRODUCTION OF EL DORADO 
COUNTY. 



No official record was kept of El Dorado county's gold pro- 
duction prior to the year 1880; and the table given below, which 
was compiled by Charles G. Yale of San Francisco, special 
agent for the United States Geological Survey, is, owing to the 
impossibility of securing correct statistics from all mine-owners, 
very inaccurate, and the actual gold output of the county is un- 
doubtedly several millions of dollars greater than these figures 
indicate. 
Year. Amount. 

1880 $389,383 00 

1881 710,230 00 

1882 600,000 00 

1883 , S30,000 00 

1884 577,716 00 

1885 383 353 85 

1886 505,992 60 

1887 551,871 38 

1888 650,000 l 

1889.. 227,688 00 

1890 204,583 90 

1891 173,279 08 

1892 198,321 54 

1893 294,610 26 

1894 366,707 67 

1895 700,10131 

1896 812,289 26 

1897 674,626 00 

1898 501,966 00 

1899 404,497 00 

1900 368,541 00 

1901 292.036 00 

1902 335,031 00 

1903 277,304 00 

1904 474,994 00 



BY THE AUTHOR OF "PIONEERS OF EL 
DORADO." 

%ik and Wcrk ef the Sled* 

%. %. 9eiree, 

■ a True Follower of Jesus. 

This little book the author calls "a humble 
tribute of love and respect for that modern 
Samaritan, whose own beautiful, consecrated 
life is his grandest epitaph/' It is simply and 
earnestly written, as befits the subject, and we 
hope it may have a large circulation and be 
very widely read, * * * There are many good 
clergymen in the world, thank God; men of 
earnest faithfulness to their ideals and their 
Master. They are the very salt of the earth. 
And of them it is good for the world to hear 
occasionally the story, told, as is this of Mr. 
Peirce, with directness and with force. He, 
one of the noblest of this band of true men, 
being dead, yet speaketh, and his works do 
follow him. He was certainly a benediction to 
Placerville and all the surrounding country, and 
all that goes to keep fresh his memory will 
simply tend to the continuance of the blessing. 
— The Pacific Churchman, San Francisco. 



Illustrated, cloth, $1.00 a copy, postage, 10 cents a copy extra; 
paper, SO cents a copy, postage 5 cents. 

CHARLES ELMER UPTON, 

Placerville. California. 



MAY 27 1907 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




017 168 244 7 § 



